All about the All systems go! symposium programme, thematic areas, thematic leads and more
Here's what to expect from the symposium on WASH systems strengthening happening 12th - 14th March 2019 at the Fokker Terminal, The Hague, the Netherlands. Register here and see you there!
All systems go! will serve as a forum for identifying where we are, and where we need to go to create strong national and local WASH systems. Aimed at senior practitioners, policy makers, and thinkers from the WASH sector and beyond, the symposium will showcase state-of-the-art thinking meant to accelerate collective learning and strengthen professional expertise in system-thinking.
This is an event that is geared towards collective action. All systems go! will provide valuable skills-building workshops, participatory sessions and numerous opportunities to engage with leading experts—all included in your standard admission fee. Familiarise yourself with the latest WASH tools, interact with the rich-diversity of content and work with your peers to identify the best solutions to propel us toward making universal access to WASH services a reality.
Join us in the pursuit of using and adapting systems approaches for real impact. Register now.
Each day of All systems go! has been tailored to fit one of three themes: Discover and provoke, Engage, create and collaborate and Deliver and do. All plenary and participatory sessions, skills-building workshops and all other happenings will fall within this larger framework.
All systems go! will explore innovative ways of using and adapting system approaches and achieve universal access to WASH services. The programme will, however, be composed of a variety of engaging sessions drawing from a rich range of topics from the various thematic areas.
See our overview by day, full programme with session descriptions or this brief summary of what to expect:
All systems go! aims to advance the use of system-based approaches to make universal access to WASH a reality for all. The first day will focus on setting the scene. Discover how holistic thinking has and can lead to lasting change. Sessions on this day will lay the foundation for the event and have been crafted to provoke and to promote discourse.
09:00-10:30 Opening plenary
This opening event will be the official welcome to the symposium. Keynote speakers will speak on systems framing for WASH. All five thematic areas and their focuses will be introduced and outlined.
10:30-11:00 Break
11:00-12:30 Sessions
Launch of sanitation and hygiene, drinking water service delivery, financing WASH, and measuring and learning thematic area sessions. Other parallel and participatory sessions on the overall symposium focus will be taking place at the same time.
12:30-13:30 Lunch
13:30-15:30 Sessions
Launch of fragile states thematic area sessions, among other parallel and participatory sessions on financing WASH, urban and rural sanitation challenges, district level WASH planning and more.
15:30-16:00 Break
16:00-17:00 Sessions
Mix of parallel and participatory sessions focus on results-based financing, the basic outcomes of WASH systems strengthening in complex settings, improving water service delivery in Latin America, among many other topics.
17:00-17:30 Closing plenary
End of day one of All systems go! brief recap of the day's highlights and a preview of what will come.
IRC's 50th Birthday Party
Come celebrate our 50th birthday party! Join us for an evening for an evening of food, fun and music! This event is open to all All systems go! participants.
Primed with a foundation on systems-thinking, participants will look to sectors beyond WASH for inspiration on promising solutions to apply in their work. The interactive sessions will be geared towards fostering engagement and will include many opportunities to collaborate with fellow participants and take a fresh perspective on the systems we work in every day.
09:00-10:00 Morning sofa discussion and keynote session
Key takeaways from day one will be highlighted. Keynote session will inspire audiences with stories of progress made in other sectors, helping gain new perspectives on existing WASH challenges.
10:00-10:30 Break
10:30-12:30 Sessions
Mix of parallel and participatory sessions for all the thematic areas concentrating on life-cycle costing, systems change in fragile states, monitoring tools, rural water maintenance models and more. A workshop on participatory factor mapping for local WASH systems and on WASH planning from a systems perspective will also be taking place.
12:30-13:30 Lunch
13:30-15:00 Sessions
Additional parallel and participatory sessions on models for reliable WASH services in fragile states, the Nakuru Accord, progress in safe drinking water in East Asia will be some of the topics on this day. Additionally, there will be an interactive session on the new WHO guidelines on sanitation and health.
15:00-15:30 Break
15:30-16:30 Session
There will be a deeper exploration of the day's focus with discussions on the challenges of national WASH financing strategies, the WASH and nutrition nexus, coalition networks and more.
16:30-17:00 Closing plenary
The Human Right to Water and Sanitation: An exclusive event at the Peace Palace
By invitation only.
Special edition Blue Drinks 'Leaving no one behind: How to support young water leaders' participation in delivering sustainable water and sanitation services?'
Parallel networking event open to all. This event will take place in the centre of The Hague and will feature two speakers. It will prompt dialogue and encourage discussion around the topic of youth participation in WASH.
This day unifies and solidifies the emerging learning from All system go! Sessions will share practical tools for systems change, identify opportunities to scale best-practices and outline how to align actions towards a shared agenda and lasting change. Although it marks the end of the symposium, it marks the start of our collective journey towards a systems approach in WASH.
09:00-10:00 Sofa discussion
This event will summarise the important outcomes from day 2, but will shift focus towards action, the theme of the day being deliver and do. Speakers will share insights on how to bring a systems approach to WASH to the fore and why it matters.
10:00-10:30 Break
10:30-12:30 Sessions
More skills building workshops on systems mapping and identifying leverage points and on building sustainable WASH competencies. Parallel and participatory sessions will concentrate on tracking financial flows, collective action, the role of civil society and more.
12:30-13:30 Lunch
13:30-14:30 Sessions
There will be a fishbowl discussion on the political economy and multimedia session on the Democratic Republic of Congo. Parallel and participatory sessions will discuss government-led monitoring, the role of various stakeholders in financial flow influencing among other issues. Participants will learn how to concretely apply the Theory of Change through a skill-building workshop.
14:30-15:00 Break
15:00-16:00 Sessions
The final sessions will speak on the power of data in inspiring change, maximising outcomes with improved government and NGO collaboration and emerging conclusions.
16:00-17:00 Closing plenary
Farewell and closing remarks for All systems go! Keynote and panel discussions will share the key conclusions from the thematic streams and share insights on opportunities to drive future change.
All systems go! will feature five thematic areas which are powered by sector experts, or thematic leads. Together, these focal points will ensure that the symposium's sessions are relevant and comprehensive.
OVERALL SYMPOSIUM FOCUS: Using and adapting systems approaches for real impact. Learning from WASH and beyond.
THEMATIC AREA 1: Understanding the systemic shifts necessary for sustained demand, provision and use of sanitation and hygiene services.
THEMATIC AREA 2: Systemic approaches to increasing safety and sustainability of drinking water service delivery.
THEMATIC AREA 3: Financing WASH: a systems approach.
THEMATIC AREA 4: Systems building in fragile states: understanding risks and opportunities for systems strengthening in a rapidly changing environment.
THEMATIC AREA 5: Measuring and learning about the WASH system and its strength.
Angela Huston joined IRC as a Programme Officer in the International and Innovation Programme in 2016. She contributes to the research and documentation of IRC's emerging praxis for working with and strengthening WASH systems. She is active in the planning, monitoring, and learning group, working most closely with the Uganda, Ethiopia, and Burkina Faso teams. Angela is a lifelong water resource and environmental advocate who transitioned into the WASH sector to take a more human-centred approach.
Angela has a B.Sc. in Environmental Chemistry, an M.Sc. in Civil Engineering, and is currently pursuing a Ph.D. at McGill University that uses tenets of systems thinking to explore approaches to measuring and monitoring WASH systems at a district scale. Angela is experienced in dialogue facilitation and arts-based methods that invite people from all backgrounds to engage as active members in civil society and problem solving. She values pragmatism and humour, loves okra soup, dancing, and exploring the outdoors.
THEMATIC AREA: OVERALL SYMPOSIUM FOCUS
Erick Baetings holds a master's degree (MSc) in Water and Environmental Management for Developing Countries from the University of Technology, Loughborough, England. He has worked for more than 30 years in the water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) sector and gained extensive working and living experience in Nepal and Bhutan (14 years), Zambia (four years) and Lao People's Democratic Republic (four years). Since his return to the Netherlands he has travelled regularly for short assignments to Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, Indonesia, Nepal and Vietnam in Asia, and Ethiopia in Africa.
Erick is a sanitation expert with rural and urban experience in developing result monitoring frameworks, facilitating sector learning, developing rapid assessment tools and applying these for sanitation related research (e.g. supply and demand studies and urban faecal waste flow assessments). He is currently working on a new results framework for the Global Sanitation Fund and developing an action research framework for the USAID Transform WASH programme in Ethiopia. His work to further develop the faecal waste flow calculator to assess and map urban faecal waste flows and associated practices is continuing.
THEMATIC AREA: SANITATION AND HYGIENE SERVICES
Dr. Christoph Lüthi is an urban infrastructure planner with over 25 years of experience in planning and design of urban infrastructure in middle and low-income countries. He has a Master's Degree in Urban Development Planning from the University College of London (UCL), and a PhD in Urban Planning & Engineering from the TU Berlin. He has worked on urban planning and basic urban service provision in several African and Asian countries.
In 2005 he joined Sandec as Leader of the Strategic Environmental Sanitation Planning Group. At Sandec he works on state-of-the-art planning tools and frameworks such as Sanitation 21 or CLUES: Community-Led Urban Environmental Sanitation. Since 2015 he heads the research department for Sanitation, Water and Solid Waste for Development (Sandec).
THEMATIC AREA: SANITATION AND HYGIENE SERVICES
Ruchika Shiva has been working with IRC for over a year, presently she working in the capacity of a Country Coordinator for India. She is involved in initiating and managing partnerships, conceptualizing projects with partners to develop the India Country Programme of IRC. She is also presently involved in the Community Water Plus project and the sanitation assessment of the Nashik Kumbh Mela.
Prior to IRC, Ruchika has worked with the India Chapter of Plan International for seven years in varied capacities. She played a crucial role in managing programmes in Bikaner (Rajasthan) and urban slums in Delhi. She actively managed grants from international donors specifically on School WASH in 7 states (Uttarkhand, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Odisha, Rajasthan, Delhi and Andhra Pradesh). Ruchika, in the early stages of her career, has also worked with grassroots organizations focusing on children in difficult circumstances.
THEMATIC AREA: SANITATION HYGIENE SERVICES
Ranjiv Khush is the co-founder and Executive Director of the Aquaya Institute (Aquaya), an international non-profit research and consulting organization. Aquaya is dedicated to to building an evidence-base that improves the effectiveness of water and sanitation development efforts in low-resource settings.
Aquaya's Monitoring for Safe Water initiative, currently funded by the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation, builds local capacity for water quality monitoring across sub-Saharan Africa. Under the Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Partnerships for Learning and Sustainability (WASHPaLS) program, which is funded by USAID and managed by Tetra Tech, Aquaya is evaluating rural sanitation improvement efforts in Asia and Africa. Aquaya is also studying urban sanitation economics through research assignments with Water and Sanitation for the Urban Poor (WSUP). To promote the development of African water and sanitation researchers, Aquaya has established the AquayaLEARN fellowship program for graduate students.
THEMATIC AREA: SAFE AND SUSTAINABLE WATER
Catarina Fonseca, IRC Head Innovation and International Department, is an economist with 21 years of experience in development cooperation and 18 in the water supply and sanitation sector. She has pioneered sector development on the understanding of life-cycle costs and financing. She is part of the IRC management team, is Head of the International and Innovation Programme of IRC and is the Watershed: empowering citizens Director. Catarina has a passion for evidence and data in support of good governance (acknowledging it's a tough call).
Before IRC, Catarina worked with a Portuguese NGO on participatory approaches in urban slums with a gender and equity emphasis. Catarina holds a PhD in Water Sciences (Cranfield University, UK), a MAs in Development Studies specialised in agriculture and rural development (International Institute of Social Studies, The Netherlands) and was originally trained as an Economist (MSs, Lisbon School of Economics and Management, Technical University, Portugal).
THEMATIC AREA: FINANCING WASH
David De Armey, Director of International Partnerships at Water for Good, has been overseeing the organization's relationships within the water sector network in the Central African Republic (CAR). David has provided leadership in advocating for improvements in the norms and directives that govern the water sector in CAR. He has also established coordination and communication systems to increase data availability for all WASH sector and WASH cluster members at a national level.
After joining Water for Good five years ago, David completed a Master of Science in Management for Sustainable Development in Dublin, Ireland, with his research thesis focused on supply chains and governance in rural Central African Republic. Water for Good has been working exclusively in the Central African Republic since 2004 with a strong focus on the development of a circuit rider maintenance model since then, collecting maintenance, spare parts, and community data electronically for the past 7 years.
THEMATIC AREA: FRAGILE STATES
Kate Neely is a researcher in the Melbourne School of Government. Kate is working on understanding research translation/mobilization practices and policy.
She has qualifications in Chemistry, Biology, Adult Education, International Development and Sociology and has worked as an educator and researcher in the Kingdom of Tonga, Timor Leste and the Northern Territory of Australia.
Her doctoral research was based in Timor Leste and applied Complex Adaptive Systems theory in order to understand the robustness (or otherwise) of spring fed water systems.
THEMATIC AREA: MEASURING AND LEARNING
Heather Skilling is the Principal Global Practice Specialist for WASH with DAI and a Consultant to the World Bank Global Water Practice.
She is an economist with more than 30 years of experience in strengthening water and sanitation service delivery in developing countries including serving as Senior Water and Sanitation Advisor with the Water Office of USAID.
Recent work includes analysis with WaterAid UK of the ways in which donors are monitoring and measuring systems' change in WASH.
THEMATIC AREA: MEASURING AND LEARNING
Jeffrey Walters is an assistant professor of civil engineering at George Fox University (GFU). His research seeks to develop participatory systems-based decision support techniques to improve engineering practice and policy for sustainable rural and urban infrastructure system design and management in developing world contexts.
His future research seeks to apply systems thinking concepts and modeling techniques to develop sustainable engineering- and management-based solutions for water, food and energy service provision in low resource urban and peri-urban contexts. He has recently begun spearheading a new multidisciplinary program at GFU in Global Engineering & Development.
THEMATIC AREA: MEASURING AND LEARNING
