Environmental Sanitation and Hygiene

© UNICEF/NEP633/MChamberlain

Improved sanitation and hygiene practices such as hand-washing with soap at critical times can result in a reduction of 45 per cent in the number of diarrhoeal cases for children aged less than five years. The Government of Nepal and UNICEF have been promoting the School Water, Sanitation and Hygiene
Education programme since 2000, and evaluation shows that it has been very successful, both in hardware provision (toilets and water supply), and behavioural change and social mobilisation. The effective use of children as agents of change has resulted in the development of the School-Led Total Sanitation programme, with schools acting as an entry point for sanitation and hygiene promotion throughout the school catchment that will ultimately ensure the environment is open-defecation-free.

Activities

• Install sanitary, child-friendly toilets, separate for girls and boys, safe drinking water and hand washing facilities, in 450 schools and, ensure that students have the knowledge and skills to maintain the cleanliness of sanitation facilities and practice proper hand-washing, through the formation of child clubs and training and hygiene promotion campaigns.
• Ensure that sanitary toilets are installed in all households in 600 school catchment ares and declared Open Defecation Free, through interpersonal promotion campaigns using participatory tools and techniques, training, revolving funds, and awards for outstanding achievement.
• Improve the knowledge and skills of parents, particularly mothers, on proper hand-washing with soap, through mass media and interpersonal promotion campaigns, dissemination of informative materials, and social mobilisation by Water Users’ Committee members and Female Community Health Volunteers.

Expected results

By 2010, socially excluded and economically marginalised people will have increased access to safe, sustainable sanitation facilities and be using improved hygiene practices. Some 600 school catchment areas will have sanitary toilet facilities, and children will participate in their management through child clubs. In the catchments of these schools, all households will have toilets and will use improved hygiene practices, particularly hand-washing with soap at critical times. The environment of these catchments will be open-defecation-free, resulting in a reduction in the number of diarrhoeal cases