Consultant Dan
08 November 2010
Free sanitation book - can good communication save a billion lives?
Most of us feel daunted by the statistics and human stories of global poverty. Like climate change, it seems so big, complex and difficult that we cannot make a difference.
My focus is on the new energy economy, but I have one client from the development sector and find it inspiring to work with them. I do strategy, lobbying and communications for WaterAid, which has a simple, effective approach to improving the lives of the global poor.
The theory and practice of WaterAid is that if we focus development work on providing clean water and sanitation to the poorest of the poor, this will lay the foundation for improving their lives in other ways.
Estimates are that 2.7 billion people lack access to WASH (water, sanitation and hygiene). People who lack WASH are frequently sick with chronic illnesses (mostly diarrhoea and respiratory disease), which has to be fixed before they can benefit from education, economic and social development.
On Global Handwashing Day (Friday 15 October 2010), WaterAid published an excellent free book on hygiene promotion in Suva, Fiji. You can download Sharing experiences: Effective hygiene promotion in South-East Asia and the Pacific here .
The Australian Agency for International Development (AusAID) funded the book through the Australian NGO Cooperation Program Innovations Fund. WaterAid’s partners in the publication are the International WaterCentre and the IRC International Water and Sanitation Centre.
It is based on case studies and shows how to communicate effectively with communities, so that they become empowered and own the campaign to get access to WASH. Can something like this help save people’s lives? I think it can. Have a look and let me know what you think.
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