School Led Safe Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Improvement in Mid-Western Areas of Nepal

Access to safe water and sustainable sanitation is a major challenge in Nepal. Although more than 80% of the people now have access to drinking water, water supplies in rural areas are contaminated. As for sanitation, Government of Nepal estimates that only 46% of the people have access to basic sanitation. Lack of safe
drinking water, poor sanitation and hygiene are the major causes of morbidity and mortality, particularly among young children. The situation is particularly bad, in the mid-western region of Nepal where only 22% of the households in the region have access to toilets and 78.3% water supply coverage. But people are compelled to collect water from the available sources regardless of quality during rainy season.


Drinking water supply schemes in proposed areas use open and unprotected surface sources likely to be contaminated anytime. The poor situation of sanitation and health in the region was exposed in 2009 when a cholera epidemic claimed the lives of more than 300 people.

ENPHO in collaboration with USAID, EAWAG and RMSO has been implementing the project in five selected VDCs (Ramghat, Kalyan, Mehalkuna, Sahare, Kaprichaur) of Surkhet district and ward no. 1, 2 and 11 of Birendranagar Municipality. The project’s goal is to improve the health and well- being of poor people in midwestern Nepal targeting to project areas through an integrated approach that improves access to safe water,
sanitation and hygiene in a sustainable manner. Initially the project coordinated with several WASH stakeholders through launching of regional WASH resource centre and district level launching program to aware them about the project activities and for further collaboration. ENPHO has established field office at Jahare, ward.no. 3, Maintada VDC and has recruited 14 field staffs. Altogether 17 field staffs were provided 5 days Training of trainers (ToT). Press conference on SODIS was held with 12 journalists and in a total interaction was done with 14 representatives from education sector on how to incorporate detail message of SODIS in the existing curriculum.

Altogether 4 VWASHCC has been formed in the project areas through combined initiation of VDC/DDO/ENPHO. ENPHO has also celebrated National Sanitation week -2067 in close collaboration with DWASHCC where 34 students have participated in essay competition and folk song on WASH was also organized. Baseline survey was done in 937 households to find out the knowledge, attitude and practice of existing WASH situation of project area.

Focus Group Discussion (FGDs) was conducted in 57 clusters where 1133 people were made on WASH issues and project activities. An issue related to gender was also collected from the project areas where interaction was done with local people of 55 clusters. It was found that most of the female members are engaged in household activities with more focus on health and hygiene condition whereas male members are active in decision making process. One day orientation training on “Rapid
Response and Hygiene Promotion” was conducted to 30 youths from project areas to sensitize them about WASH issues and make them prepare for immediate emergency.

Baseline survey was conducted in 55 schools of 5 VDCs in Surkhet district where the total number of students is 13478. The main drinking water source is water supply (29.09%) followed with temporary pipeline (21.82%)and 16.36% depend upon river. It has been found that although 46 schools have toilet, 33 schools need renovation and improvement activities in sanitation facilities. Only 7 schools have hand-washing station. The most challenging factor is scarcity of water. Altogether 9787 households are situated in the periphery of catchment area where 40% HHs have toilet.

The project area consists of 1 health post and 4 sub-health posts with 124 FCHVs. The main source of drinking water is tap, spring and river. Out of five health centres, four health centres has adopted filtration as water treatment method. The condition of toilets in Ramghat, Kalyan and Kaprichaur SHP is good. But the toilets of Mehelkuna HP and Sahare SHP need immediate improvement. Only one SHP namely Sahare has water facility in the toilet, hand-washing station with soap. But all these facilities were not present in Kaprichaur SHP.

Although Kalyan SHP has water and hand-washing facility, there was no soap at the station. In an average, it was found that there is an increase in diarrhoeal cases in Ashad, Shrawan, Chaitra and Baiskah. It was assumed that the main cause of diarrhoea was due to contaminated water, dirty food and negligence in personal hygiene practices.


Several issues like different subsidy rate for toilet construction, demand of water supply, lack of safe hygiene behaviour, use of safe drinking water during disaster and lack of coordination among WASH stakeholders were identified.

Source: Su-SWASTHA (2011)Semi-Annual Report 2011. ENPHO.