E-Bulletin

E-bulletin

ENPHO E-Bulletin January - February 2013

EDITORIAL

This issue highlights recent capacity building trainings on solid waste management, sanitation facilities and Urine Application in Agriculture initiatives conducted by ENPHO. Other resources include a guide for local skill human resources on developing a construction of hygienic sanitation services in Far-western region. This issue also provides links to unreached stakeholders for sanitation facilities. ENPHO also would able to take many perceive innovative experiences in this event with in very short time. This is our January & February e-bulletin of the year 2013 with the details of in brief which took place within the months.


	LESSON TO BE LEARNED FROM ACHIEVEMENT
	No compromise in toilet construction Mr.Tiley Badi, 46 is a resident of Lamana, Kalyan VDC-7, Surkhet District. His wife works abroad and has sent him money to build toilet at their home. But he spent all of the money drinking alcohol. When the VDC strictly asked people on building toilets and told them they will be cut off from all their facilities, he had no other choices. And finally he constructed a permanent toilet. Due to the lack of money he broke down a portion of wall from his own home to meet the need of raw materials for the toilet. Mr. Badi proudly said, “I finally made the toilet and now I am eligible for sanitation card”. He added, “My wife will be very happy to see the card when she gets back”. When asked about the wall of his home, he replied that he will renovate it sooner and pointed out that he did not regret what he did. He said, “After constructing the toilet, I understand its importance now and why the VDC and SuSwastha Project, ENPHO were giving so much pressure. I think health is more important than that wall and I did not want to compromise on constructing toilet. It has also taught me that I need to save money rather than spending it on drinks.” Practice before you preach Mr. Lalit Thapa, teacher of Laxmi NMV, Kalyan-7 used to defecate in forest. After receiving 3 days’ ToT on SLTS and orientation on sanitation and hygiene from the project, Mr. Basnet constructed a permanent toilet. Mr. Basnet said, “After receiving ToT from ENPHO, we made plans on giving trainings and orientations to child clubs and community people on sanitation. I did not have any toilet in my home though I was a teacher myself. So, I felt guilty and unconfident on training others. So, before giving awareness to others, I built permanent toilet at my home within a week.” Mr. Basnet, further added, “After that, I was able to face ENPHO team and tell them that I was ready to conduct the trainings at the schools”. - By Ms. Purnima Shakya, Project Officer, ENPHO
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	:: ENPHO NEWS ::

	REFRESHER TRAINING TO JHAUKHEL VDC COMMUNITY IN BHAKTAPUR ENPHO together with Jhaukhel drinking water and sanitation user committee has conducted 20 trainings on H&H, Latrine, SWM, ICS and PoU option of household drinking water treatment for the community of Jhaukhel VDC from 11th December, 2012 to 15 January, 2013. Altogether 550 community people took participation on these trainings. The main objective of the training was to aware and give knowledge on water, health and sanitation. The importance of personal hygiene practice, types of latrines, safe drinking water through PoU options and household solid waste management were discussed during the training.

	WASTE ART MANUFACTURING TRAINING FOR WOMEN IN SURKHET Solid waste is one of the major environmental problems in urban area. Plastic constitutes major parts of waste that deteriorate urban beauty along with other many environmental health problems. Many municipalities are spending lots of human and financial resource for effective management of solid waste. Considering this issues, ENPHO in closed coordination with Birendranagar Municipality and Nepal WASH Alliance organized 5 days training on “waste art manufacturing and entrepreneurship development” dated from 6-10 January 2013 at Birendranagar, Surkhet. All together 20 women from different wards were participated the training program. The training program was mainly focused on preparation of waste art from waste plastic that can be used in household and office for different purpose. The hand on training was facilitated by the team from THE SEWA- a NGO based in Chitwan. Different attractive waste art like dustbin, purse, tea mat, bag were prepared using waste plastics. “I including my neighbor used to throw plastic at road side or sometimes burned which makes very bad environment at our community. But from today I collect all plastics and prepared different waste art that I learned to prepared in this training”- said Mrs. Janaki Khadka, participants form ward number 12. Also, at the closing of the training program Mr. Yamlal Dhakal, Chief Executive Officer of Birendranagar Municipality committed to support for waste art business and market creation.

	ORIENTATION PROGRAM ON URINE APPLICATION IN AGRICULTURE One day orientation program on “Urine Application in Agriculture” was organized at Birendranagar, Surkhet and Baddichaur Agriculture College dated on 8th and 13th January 2013. More than 45 farmers were participated in Birendranagar program and 56 people were participated in Baddichaur program. The orientation program was facilitated by ENPHO staff and Mr. Sirendra Pokhrel who have more than 6 years of experience in urine application. The program was organized in closed coordination with agriculture schools, Krisi hatbazar and Birendranagar Municipality and supported by RUAF Foundation-the Netharlands WASTE and Nepal WASH Alliance. Mr. Rene Van Veenhuizen from RUAF Foundation and Dr. Suman K. Kumar Shakya, Executive Director, ENPHO were also gave few remarks on this program.

	MASSON TRAINING 5 days training on construction of toilet was successfully completed with the joint coordination between ENPHO WET Center, CAWST and Village Development Committee (VDC) of Maintada. The training was organized from 19-25 January, 2013 at Maintada-3, Jahare. Objective of the training was to train some masons for toilet construction as per the need and affordability of the people. Practical sessions for toilet construction was done in the house of Mr. Dhanbir Bohara Who is a local resident living with three family members that included a 15 years old mentally challenged girl.

	FEMALE COMMUNITY HEALTH VOLUNTEERS TRAINING Female Community Health Volunteers (FCHV) training was organized by ENPHO WET Center from 23-25 January, 2013 at Maintada-3, Jahare with the objective to train and aware female health volunteers in order to aware people about the ODF program and total sanitation campaign going on in the area. Altogether 40 participants took part in the program where they learnt various aspects of water and sanitation through PowerPoint presentation, audio/visual, interactions and games. Participants were also oriented on their roles and responsibility for helping the toilet building program in the area and supporting the campaign from their part up to the successful completion of ODF objective in the VDC.

	IMPROVEMENT OF WASH FACILITIES AT INSTITUTIONAL LEVEL ENPHO with the support of USAID and EAWAG constructed and rehabilitated safe water supply at 37 schools within the five VDCs (Ramghat, Kalyan, Mehelkuna, Sahare and Kaprichaur) of SuSwastha Project. Similarly, construction of concrete water tank and pipelines in Kaprichaur sub-health post has been completed by Feb 2013. On the other hand, improvement on WASH facilities at the sub-health posts of Kalyan and Sahare have been commenced. With the collaborative effort of the VDCs and ENPHO, construction of public toilet at Kaprichaur, Sahare and Kalyan has been completed.

	INTERACTION PROGRAM WITH TLOS AND MOTHER GROUPS One day interaction program with TLOs and Mother Groups was organized by ENPHO for sharing the sanitation programme progress at ward number 2 and 11 at Birendranagar Municipality, Surkhet. The progress of sanitation promotion and challenges faced during promotion activities were shared and discussed for possible initiatives taken to overcome such issues. Also, the TLOs members are committed to declare open defection free zone by end of April 2013.

	ORIENTATION PROGRAM ON WASH AND DISASTER FOR FCHVS, CHVS AND LOCAL STAKEHOLDERS Total fourteen “Two days orientation on WASH and Disaster for FCHVs’, CHVs’ and local stakeholders” of ward no. 5, 14, 15, 17, 19, Imadol ward no. 6 and Dhapakhel ward no.1 was conducted at Staff College, Jawalakhel from February 13 to March 7 by ENPHO under the UDRM (Urban Disaster Risk Management) Project. The objective of orientation program was to empower Female Community Health Volunteer, Community Health Volunteer, other stakeholders, regarding WASH and Disaster Risk Reduction. From each community there were 30 total participants in single program. Altogether 265 people were trained on WASH/DRR issues. Participants were oriented in the terminology, concept of earthquake and importance of WASH in emergencies. After completion of two days orientation, interested participants conducted two hour orientation in their own community.

	TALKING ABOUT ROLE OF YOUTH IN WASH AND DEVELOPMENT With an objective to provide an opportunity for social interaction and knowledge sharing on WASH and its role on development and to critically analyze Youth’s role in development, February series of WASH Forum entitled “Bond between WASH and Development: Opportunities for Youth” was successfully conducted on 22nd February 2013 at ENPHO hall, Thapaguan. Mr. Ashutosh Tiwari, Country Representative, Water Aid Nepal was the key speaker of February series of WASH forum which had total of 25 participants. Mr. Tiwari during his sharing program highlighted the importance of Data driven advocacy and with various examples proved its effectiveness. He motivated the youths to have their approach data driven because data have their own life, and are very powerful. He encouraged youths to play with data and feel its impact. Few results of that brainstorming was Bio gas plant in community, Composting, proper solid waste management, small scale urban agriculture, dry eco-san, reduction in use of plastic in household and etc. Mr. Rajesh Adhikari Promotional Manager of ENPHO rejuvenated the participants with his motivating concluding lines.
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	:: LOCAL NEWS ::

	80 PC HOSPITALS LACK MEDICAL WASTE MANAGEMENT: REPORT KATHMANDU, Jan 26: More than three-fourths of the hospitals in the country do not practice safe disposal of health-care waste, states a report issued on Friday. According to a report published here by the NGO Center for Public Health and Environmental Developmental (CEPHED), 80.65 percent of hospitals lack mechanisms for disposing of health-care waste such as used syringes, bandages, body parts and diagnostic samples. The study conducted by CEPHED at 31 hospitals shows that 16 percent of the hospitals get their water supplies from badly protected areas. However, the rest of the hospitals do have acceptable sources of water. “This report has shown the poor health quality of our nation. The government should improve all its services and provide quality health services,” said Ram Charitra Shah, executive director of CEPHED, who led a team of researchers to prepare the report. Similarly, only 22 percent hospitals have conducted an Environment Impact Assessment (EIA). Hospitals that avoided EIA pose a threat to environment, public health and the entire garbage disposal system. According to the Environment Act-1997, one should have EIA clearance to open a hospital, but a significant number of hospitals do not have such clearance. “Following the legal provisions on EIA is a must,” said Keshab Bhattarai, secretary at the Ministry of Science and Technology. Likewise, the report shows that the 10 percent free health service provision has not been implemented at any health organization. And 35.48 percent of the hospitals lack knowledge about proper hand-washing practices. Similarly, 90.32 percent of hospitals do not at all have any environmentally sound waste treatment system. The research report titled Environmental Health Condition of Hospitals in Nepal is based on detailed evidence gathered by CEPHED with the financial support of the World Health Organization (WHO). The report was jointly launched by Bhattarai and Dr. Pravin Mishra, secretary at the Ministry of Health and Population (MOHP). “We should put in place a framework to tackle the problem of hospital waste management because the issue poses a serious threat to public heath and environment,” said Bhattarai. Source: Republica CLEANING UP OPEN DEFECATION IN NEPAL By: Giri Bahadur Sunar It is well known that the nation is suffering much more due to poor sanitation than anything else. The widespread practice of open defecation has highly negative impacts on the health of the surrounding community. Water born diseases like diarrhea and cholera are the results of the practice of open defecation. Every year, billions of rupees are going outside the country in treatment. Presently, about 5.5 million people do not have adequate water services, and 16 million lack adequate sanitation facilities. 94 percent households have access to improved drinking water sources in urban areas, compared to 78 percent in rural areas. However, the service level of urban water suppliers is generally poor. The national target of universal access to water and sanitation by 2017 is under a question mark. There is a wide gap between the present status of sanitation coverage, 43 percent, and the targeted universal coverage. We have progressed from hunting-gathering age to post-modern age. We have changed our eating habits and use spoons instead of hands, we wear stylish clothing instead of remaining unclothed, we wear shoes instead of walking barefoot, and travel on air buses instead of bullock carts. But we haven’t been able to change our attitude to defecating in open spaces since the hunting-gathering age. We are very quick to copy western culture and style, but not their emphasis on sanitation and healthy living. The global society has progressed so much, but we Nepalese still have to convince each other to stop open defecation, and continue to expect support from government and donor agencies to build our own toilets. We are experts on giving ideas and sharing knowledge, but our behavior is still the same. What a shame! The question here is not of whether spreading knowledge to stop defecation in open space is proper. The question is of our dignity in global society. Print and electronic media continuously disseminate knowledge of sustainable environment and healthy living, but we do not care! For example, diarrhea is largely a WASH (Water, Sanitation and Hygiene) related disease and a major cause of infant mortality. Every year people are dying of water borne diseases like diarrhea and cholera, but we are unaware of it. The incident of Haiti could be an example. The spread of cholera took many lives in Haiti. A special investigation consultant from France declared that the cholera was caused by UN appointed Nepali soldiers, making our sanitation status notorious among the global community. Every day in Nepal, we hear news of open defecation areas, the most prominent ones being in Sundarijal. People of Sundarijal VDC have complained to the Nepal Army appointed to protect Electricity production yard in Sundarijal, who were found to be directly discharging their latrine into the Bagmati River. If Nepal Army personnel, being part of a government body, are not aware of health and sanitation, then how can the locals be? There are many slogans about saving Bagmati, but again, no one cares. There are many NGOs, INGOs, CSOs and government agencies appointed to clean Bagmati, but most programs do not progress beyond documentation. Kathmandu Upatyaka Khanepani Limited (KUKL) is tapping water from different sources around Kathmandu Valley, but the water is not safe to drink without proper filtration. Some of the reservoirs are damaged, and garbage is found floating on top of them. Open defecation is found around most of the sources, and Valley dwellers are consuming it every day in the form of water. How long will it continue? How long will the people of Kathmandu have to drink polluted water? How long will people have to suffer from water borne diseases? Due to media sensitization, the Project Implementation Directorate (PID) of Kathmandu Upatyaka Khanepani Limited (KUKL) has belatedly realized the importance of the issue, and initiated awareness campaigns and workshops around the water tapping sources. One of the examples could be Sundarijal VDC. The Village Water Sanitation and Hygiene Coordination Community (VWASHCC) of Sundarijal is very active, and has taken an oath to declare the area “open defecation-free” by May 8, 2013. Having a latrine in the house is not enough to declare an area open defecation-free, the important part is having community toilets and stopping direct discharge of latrine into the water sources. There are some villages where latrines are built by the support of donor agencies, but people prefer to go to the jungle to defecate, and use the toilets as storage instead. Local people are not willing to change their behavior, but instead are demanding that some development projects be implemented in their locality in return for the government’s tapping of their water sources. KUKL/PID should address the demand of local people by building some community toilets and launching long lasting health and sanitation campaigns in their locality, so that the community people and valley dwellers can live healthy. There are a few physically disabled people and poor households who can’t afford personal latrines. In this regard, the people who are better off must support those who are not so well off. Tourists and picnickers prefer areas with water sources and greenery for their outings. Such areas should be identified and initiatives taken to stop water pollution and sustain a healthy environment. Sundarijal, Mahankal-Chaur, Chapagaon, Pharping, Jhormahankal, Chahare, Bode, Mahadevkhola, and Manamaiju are sources used by KUKL. These sources need to be protected, and health and sanitation campaigns should be launched in these areas by PID/KUKL, similar to the one in Sundarijal VDC. We valley dwellers are proud of our civilized status, but our reputation in international media says otherwise. Foreigners who visit Kathmandu skid on stinking defecation. Is this civilization? It’s not that there are no public toilets in Nepal. There are, but they are out of date. The government of Nepal has no time to think about it, so there are no maintenance activities. It is time to think it differently, and community people have to take the initiative. Community toilets need to be built so that the community members have ownership over it, and can directly monitor the facilities and keep them up to date. Source: Republica IGNORANCE OF VISUALLY IMPAIRED IN SANITATION Sushil Adhikari, 21, is a blind student. He lives at a college hostel in Kathmandu. The toilet at his hostel does not have appropriate facilities for him. There are no handrail for him to hold on to, nor footprints that he can feel to guide him on the way to the toilet. As a result, he has to move his hand in and around the toilet to find where the pit hole is. This makes his hands dirty, not to mention that he has a hard time defecating in the right spot. Many times, he defecates outside the hole, and dirties the toilet. Other students and administrators at the hostel are irritated with him because of the extra cleaning that is required to look after. Sushil cannot see. His lack of sight is natural. But the obstacles present in the society make him all the more disabled. We call these obstacles as barriers. There are two kinds of barriers: physical barriers and attitudinal barriers. Physical barriers are man-made or are present in the environment. For Sushil, having a toilet at a distance is a barrier. Not having appropriate signposts to the toilet is an additional barrier. What’s more, not having information that he can use with regard to where the water source is or where the pit hole is inside the toilet on the wet and slippery floor add up to further barriers. Attitudinal barrier is another type. Attitudinal barrier comes up due to perceptions of the society towards people with disabilities. These barriers are present because of innate negative attitude toward disability and/or due to lack of knowledge about disability on other people’s part. In Sushil’s case, the hostel administrators’ taking his blindness as a problem, their not considering accessibility in toilet design, their not consulting Sushil for the toilet design, and their lack of knowledge about special needs that blind people face – all these are vivid examples of attitudinal barriers. The solution to Sushil’s lack of access to user-friendly sanitation facilities starts from identifying and then reducing or removing these physical and attitudinal barriers. Source: Nepal WASH Blog
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	:: GLOBAL NEWS ::

	UN: FORGET FOREIGN AID, NEPAL NEEDS A GOOD PLUMBER The United Nations reports that hundred of millions of dollars invested to provide clean water and sewage in Nepal haven’t budged disease rates for water-related illness in children one bit. What went wrong? Citing statistics from Nepal’s water authority, the world body claims that the number of kids with serious water-related illness remains exactly the same as it was ten years ago: 14 percent. That sounds low, but intestinal problems and dehydration are among the most serious threats to children under five in Nepal, as is true in most countries with sketchy water systems. Where’d the money go? A Water, Sanitation and Hygiene officer with the UN office in Kathmandu, Madhav Pahari, argued it all went to a few places, rather than generally through the country. If a water tap built by one agency stops running, instead of repairing it, locals will request a different agency to build a new water supply system. As a result, some village development committees (VDCs) are saturated with water supply schemes, while others have none, said UNICEF’s Pahari. That sounds absurd. Why did they do that? Sudha Shrestha, another UN official in Nepal, whose job appears to be to get pissed at the local government, argued it was about the need to show quick success against a thorny problem. Water and sanitation projects too often target communities most easily reached by road or air, which are already better-off, said Shrestha at UN-HABITAT. “If I go to a district for an intervention, I will choose a place where I can get quick results.” OK. But what’s with all the shouting now? The report from IRIN—the UN’s news service—reads (see link above) like somewhat of a messaging exercise, designed to express the world body’s frustration with the failure of aid programs, at the hands of the local bodies. Nanda Bahadur Khanal, an engineer in the Kathmandu urban development department, seems onboard, and is pretty specific about why. We’ll see if Khanal’s still getting invited to work tomorrow. Officials have only recently identified that in addition to last year’s .3 million WASH budget, another million was funneled by donors to water and sanitation projects, but not in collaboration with any government agencies and, therefore, did not appear on any official expense statements. “Externally channeled money makes up about 30 percent of investment in the sector, but its geographical coverage is not even 5 percent,” calculated Khanal at the MoUD. “That money has not been used effectively.” Source: Pacific standard UPTAKE OF HAND WASHING WITH SOAP OR SOAPY WATER FROM A LARGE-SCALE CLUSTER RANDOMIZED COMMUNITY TRIAL IN URBAN BANGLADESH Small-scale studies have shown that intensive hand washing promotion reduces disease, but there is little evidence that large-scale hand washing promotion programs change behavior. We deployed a community-based hand washing promotion intervention and used the presence of water and soap or soapy water at hand washing stations as a proxy indicator for hand washing behavior and found encouraging results. A cluster randomized cholera vaccine trial conducted in a low-income urban area of Dhaka included those who received the vaccine only (Vaccine Only group), those who received the vaccine and a hand washing and water treatment intervention (Vaccine+HWT group), and those who were neither vaccinated nor received the intervention (Control group). Among the Vaccine+HWT group, the presence of water and soap or soapy water at the hand washing place increased from 22% (41/190) at baseline to 60% (102/171) at the 11-month assessment point (p<0.001). We found no significant increase in the presence of water and soap or soapy water among the Control group or the Vaccine Only group during the same period. Our findings suggest that hand washing behavior changed following implementation of a large-scale intervention in a low-income urban setting that provided hardware to enable hand washing and encouraged regular hand washing. Further research on health impact of hand washing with soap in this community and the sustainability of using soapy water could help optimize recommendations for improving hand washing practices in other low-income communities. Source: WASH Plus (Urban Health Updates)
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ENPHO E-Bulletin December 2012

EDITORIAL

This issue features recent HWTS trainings, launch of awareness raising tool kit, and VDC ODF initiatives conducted by ENPHO. Other resources include a guide for entrepreneurs on developing a water treatment business and a market exploration for water supply, sanitation and hygiene services in Far-western region. This issue also provides links to unreached stakeholders for HWTS. ENPHO also would able to take many perceive innovative experiences in this event with in very short time. This is our December e-bulletin of the year 2012 with the details of in brief which took place within the months.


	Algae based recovery of nutrients from Digested Black Water (DBW)
	Domestic wastewater is comprised of both the concentrated and the less concentrated wastewater streams which are namely black water and grey water respectively. Black water is the wastewater collected only from the toilet containing fecal matter and urine whereas the grey water contains wastewater from the activities like bathing, laundry and dishwashing within the house. Black water and grey water differ significantly in composition and volume. In the Netherlands, the amount of black water produced per person per year is 14m3 and grey water produced per person per year is 35m3. Even though the amount of black water produced is less compared to grey water, the nutrients (N, P, K) contained in black water are higher than that in grey water. According to figure 1, black water contains the highest amount of nutrients among all other waste sources within the house. In the present situation, both of these wastewater streams are mixed along with rainwater and transported to a central wastewater treatment plant through an extended sewerage system. The mixed wastewater stream treated in the central wastewater treatment plant dilutes the carbon and nutrients rich streams resulting in much higher flows. Moreover, this treatment system requires large amount of space and energy, making it very expensive to operate and reducing the opportunity to recover the nutrients. Besides the conventional treatment system, wastewater can be treated according to new sanitation concepts, such as DEcentralized SAnitation and Reuse (DESAR). In this concept, the wastewater stream is separated at source (black and grey water) and treated separately. This concept has been adopted by many organizations, housing etc. in recent times. One of the organizations which adopted DESAR concept is The Netherlands Institute of Ecology (NIOO-KNAW, The Netherlands) office building to treat their wastewater. NIOO-KNAW aims to recover the nutrients and energy from the separated wastewater streams. Black water is digested in an Up flow Anaerobic Sludge Blanket (UASB) reactor. The digested black water (DBW) or effluent from UASB reactor still contains high concentrations of inorganic nitrogen and phosphorus. The average values of NH4-N and PO4-P in the effluent of a UASB reactor fed with black water are respectively 1 gN/L and 0.069 gP/L. Therefore, there is a great potential to recover these nutrients from the digested black water. Microalgae are recognized to have a great potential for the removal of nitrogen and phosphorus from wastewater. Microalgae are unicellular autotrophic organisms which depend on photosynthesis for their growth. In this process they require light, carbon dioxide and nutrients (like nitrogen, phosphorus etc.) to produce biomass and oxygen as end products. Moreover, microalgae are efficient and have high capacity to uptake inorganic nutrient which are later trapped in their biomass. Harvesting this algal biomass and its proper utilization also means effective recycling of nutrients and prevention of pollution. The algal biomass produced is very rich in nutrients and can be used as animal feed supplement, slow-release fertilizer and as a source for biofuel production. There are studies confirming that nutrients can be recovered from diluted animal wastewater and conventionally treated domestic wastewater which have low nutrients concentration using microalgae. These studies thereby indicate that it might be possible to use microalgae for nitrogen and phosphorus recovery from the digested black water from UASB reactor. This study was conducted to identify the best algae species which can grow in the undiluted digested black water from a UASB reactor in order to recover the nutrients. In this study, 6 green algae species (Chlorella vulgaris, Scenedesmus obliquus, Desmodesmus sp. Chlorella pyrenoidosa, Chlorella sorokiniana and Ulothrix zonata), 3 cyanobacteria species (Synechococcus elongates, Synechocystis sp. and Anabaena flos-aquae) and 1 diatoms species (Astrionella formosa) were used. Batch experiments were performed in which ten different algae species were tested for their growth in undiluted DBW. Among these ten species, four green algae species showed growth, namely C. vulgaris, C. sorokiniana, C. pyrenoidosa and Scenedesmus obliquus. The maximum growth was seen in batch experiment with C. sorokiniana. Similarly, the maximum removal of ammonium nitrogen was 30.35% by C. sorokiniana and the maximum removal of phosphorus was 92.82% by Scenedesmus obliquus at the end of 23 days of batch experiment. Furthermore, two mixed algae cultures (Synechocystis sp. & C. sorokiniana and S. obliquus & C. sorokiniana) were also tested in batch experiment. In both mixed algae culture, C. sorokiniana outperformed other algae species in the culture flask at the end of the experiment. The end result of this study showed that it is possible to grow algae in undiluted DBW and to recover the nutrients from it. Among all the algae species tested, Chlorella sp. seemed to be more suitable for growing in undiluted DBW. At present the importance of nutrients present in the wastewater streams have long been realized in developed countries and hence many researches are being conducted to recover nutrients from wastewater streams. But unfortunately in context of Nepal, even proper guidelines for treatment of domestic wastewater and the quality of wastewater discharge have not been developed yet. Therefore, it’s important that our country Nepal also realizes the importance of treatment of wastewater and its worth for other beneficial uses. It’s time we develop “POO is GOLD” mentality!. - By Mr. Rabin Shrestha, Research Officer, ENPHO (Research Project conducted in The Netherlands Institute of Ecology (NIOO-KNAW, The Netherlands)
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	:: ENPHO NEWS ::

	BIO-SAND FILTER CONSTRUCTION TRAINING TO ARMED POLICE FORCE (APF), POKHARA ENPHO-WET Centre is providing different capacity building trainings on WASH and entrepreneurship development on Bio-sand filter supported by CAWST in different part of Nepal. Following the mission, five days training on construction of bio-sand filter for AFP was done in Pokhara from 10-14^th December, 2012. The main objective of the training was to build the capacity of armed police force to construct the bio-sand filter followed by different specific objectives i.e. explain important of safe water, water borne diseases, different household water treatment options etcetera. In the history of ENPHO-WETC, it's a first training among the armed police force personnel and there were different 22 participants from 8 districts of western region representing 12 office of armed police force which was the interesting part of training. Mr. Shambhu Prasad Upreti, Battalion commander was very excited about this technology and very much thankful to the organizer. During the closing ceremony of training, he said "BSF is a very good and effective technology, we will promote it all over the country within APF office and will show an example to all and will motivate different community organization for using safe drinking water." He added, "Within a month we construct 10 BSF and rotate the mold to all those APF office from where police personnel are participated in this training and we will send one concrete bio-sand filter as model to country head quarter office soon, this is what I commit." The training was organized in collaboration with ENPHO, CAWST, Regional WASH Resource Centre, Pokhara and APF Kalika battalion. The training sessions were facilitated by Mr. Betman Bhandari, International Technical Advisor CAWST, Ms. Yasoda Shrestha, WETC Coordinator, Mr. Kashikant Thakur and Ms. Kamala K.C. WETC Trainers, Mr. Hari Budathoki and Mr. Sivadas Gamal, WETC technicians.

	COMMUNITY HEALTH PROMOTION TRAINING AT NAGARKOT V.D.C. ENPHO-WET Center together with CAWST and Water Aid Nepal organized 4 days Community Health Promotion (CHP) training for the members of Village WASH Coordination committee (VWASHCC) and Female Community Health volunteers (FCHV) on 10-13^th December, 2012 at Hotel Sunrise, Nagarkot, where 17 people including 10 VWASHCC member and 7 FCHVs were participated. Focusing on different objectives like to describe and share the different Water, Sanitation and Hygiene related information, facts and technology to the participants, make participants able to identify different knowledge, attitude, skills and roles of community health promoters and participants will able to use different participatory learning and action tools, the training was organized in Nagarkot, newly selected project area of ENPHO. This training was facilitated by Mr. Betman Bhandari, International advisor CAWST, Mr. Kashikant Thakur, WETC Trainer, Ms. Kamala K.C. WETC trainer and Ms. Srijana Shakya, Field Coordinator.

	WATER SAFETY PLAN TRAINING AT JHAUKHEL On 25^th December 2012, ENPHO organized one day training on water safety plan (WSP) for the Jhaukhel Water and Sanitation Users’ committee, sub users’ committee of ward no 1 and 2. The objectives of the training were to aware the water supply committee for as: How the water can be contaminated from the source to household level How to prevent contamination of source waters To treat the water to reduce or remove contamination that could be present to the extent necessary to meet the water quality targets To prevent re-contamination during storage, distribution and handling of drinking-water

	AWARENESS RAISING TOOLKIT LAUNCHED ENPHO, with the support from the Asia Foundation and various collaborating partners, published an “Awareness Raising Toolkit”. The toolkit was launched at the regional level on 27^th December 2012 at Hotel Himalaya by the chief guest Mr. Abadh Kishore Mishra, Director of Project Implementation Directorate. The main objective of preparing the toolkit was to have a common understanding between various organizations conducting awareness programs. This toolkit is supposed to ultimately give positive impact on achieving behavioral change communication (BCC). ENPHO is leading to implement the toolkit with the combined effort of five organizations, viz. Alliance of Sustainable Development (ASD), Clean Energy Nepal (CEN), ENPHO/ Paschim Paaila, Smart Paani and Society of Urban Poor (SOUP). The implementation of the toolkit will commence from January to May 2013 for testing.

	ODF DECLARATION AT SAHARE VDC Sahare VDC of Surkhet district has been declared as an ODF Zone on 27th December 2012 under Su-SWASTHA project of ENPHO with the financial support of USAID and EAWAG. The event was celebrated on the chairmanship of VDC Secretary Mr. Prakash Acharya. Mr. Bhojendra Kumar Chhetri, Local Development Officer was a chief guest on the occasion. In order to help meet the target of district plan of Surkhet within 2015, Sahare VDC has added one of the contributions by being the 18th ODF VDC of Surkhet. District representatives of the Government, different NGOs, Political leaders, journalists, local institutions and community participation made the event more dynamic. “ODF declaration program is one of the symbols of achieving victory on sanitation movement. For long term result, all constructed toilets should be in use. For that, regular and effective monitoring is compulsory”, said Mr. Bhojendra Kumar Chhetri. Mr. Kiran Oli, member secretary of V-WASH-CC, presented the sanitation situation of VDC where out of total 2262 HH, 2001 were permanent, 220 temporary and 22 HH were using shared latrines. Executive Director of ENPHO Dr. Suman Kumar Shakya, Engineer of RMSO Mr. Arjun Bam, Political representatives Mr. Man Bdr GC, Mr. Ananta Paudel, Mr. Gagan Sunar, Chairperson of Federation of Water and Sanitation User Mr. Kulmani Devkota shared their remarks on the occasion. The program celebrated with huge mass rally and different cultural shows of local community.

	WASH FORUM DECEMBER SERIES WASH forum is a common interaction forum for knowledge sharing and advocacy regarding water, sanitation & hygiene which is conducted every last Friday of English month. Following this trend, in 28^th December 2012, WASH forum entitled “Gender and WASH: A matter of Key concern to Youth” was held at Environment and Public Health Organization (ENPHO) hall, Thapagaun, New Baneswor. The objective of the forum was set as to provide the opportunity for social interaction and knowledge sharing on Sanitation, Gender and Youth; and to critically analyze the issues of Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) relating to gender and Youth, focusing on how it can be a matter of concern to this particular group. Nurse by profession, Ms. Kalawati Pokhrel, country coordinator of Nepal WASH Alliance (NWA) was the key speaker of the WASH forum who not only drew youth’s attention towards Gender friendly WASH and its importance but also made us realize about the current scenario of water, sanitation and hygiene. Her long experience and good sense of humor kept the spirit of the forum where she even showed us the proper way of formation of WASH committee which is gender friendly and inclusive. Ms. Pokhrel related youths with gender, and requested them to be honest, sincere, responsible and corruption free. The program had total 32 participants which was facilitated by Mr. Roshan Chaulagain, and coordinated by Ms. Rubita Pulami. Mr. Rajesh Adhikari, Promotional Manager of ENPHO, encouraged the participants with his enthusiastic welcome speech and Mr. Phurba sange Moktan inspired them with his concluding words.

	PRESENTATION/PARTICIPATION: Dr. Suman K. Shakya, Executive Director of ENPHO has participated and presented in “3rd International Symposium on Health Hazards of Arsenic Contamination of Groundwater and Its Countermeasures”, jointly organized by University of Miyazaki and IRISH “International Research and Innovation for Sustainable Human-life”, Miyazaki, Japan, 23 – 25 Nov, 2012. Dr. Suman K. Shakya, Executive Director of ENPHO has participated and presented in “The Annual BORDA BNS Partner Meeting 2012” organized by CDD Society and Bremen Overseas Research and Development Association (BORDA), at Bangalore, India, 26-28 November, 2012. Dr. Suman K. Shakya, Executive Director of ENPHO has presented the paper on “Point of Drinking Water Treatment Options in Nepal and participated in a whole-cell arsenic biosensor with visual readout for use in the field program”, in a forum organized by the Chancellor, Masters and Scholars of the University of Cambridge, United Kingdom, 8 – 15 Dec, 2012.
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	:: LOCAL NEWS ::

	KMC TO MONITOR ILLEGAL WASTE TARIFF Kathmandu Metropolitan City has failed to stop private companies from charging illegal tariff on waste collection. Kedar Bahadur Adhikari, KMC executive chief said they had received oral reports that private companies were charging illegal waste tariff from people. “Companies not registered with us are also collecting waste tariff,” he said. “We will monitor them,” he added. KMC is yet to monitor private companies charging illegal tariff on waste collection from the public. Rameshwor Bhandari of Baneshwor, Kathmandu, was taken aback when the waste collecting NGO increased Rs 100 on Rs 200 monthly tariff. There are about 100,000 households with about one million populations in the metropolis and some 350 metric tonnes of waste is produced daily. After getting approval from the municipal council, KMC had decided to charge Rs 185 to Rs 60,000 per household, every month for garbage collection from the current year. However, it is yet to be implemented. KMC is preparing to hand over waste collection from households to the private sector through bidding process. KMC does not have exact data of NGOs and private companies collecting waste from households. The private companies are collecting waste tariff arbitrarily. Clubs and NGOs, were charging at least Rs 150 from each household for waste collection even though it was illegal then, as the Waste Management Act 2011 was implemented only last fiscal, which provisioned waste collection tariff for the first time. “If the complaints are lodged in written, we will monitor and take action against them,” said Rabin Man Shrestha, chief of the Environment Management Division, KMC. “We do not know the exact number of NGOs working and the tariff they are charging,” he said. In line with the spirit of the Act, KMC has fixed Rs 185 per month for a household producing 10 litres of waste per day. The charge may vary according to the amount of waste. Five star hotels will have to pay up to Rs 60,000 per month while hospitals will have to pay about Rs 15,000 per month. KMC, known as one of the dirtiest cities in the world for poor waste management, started working to fix waste collection charges about a year ago. Along with the fee ceiling, the metropolis had promised to make segregation of disposable and non-disposable waste mandatory from the household level and provide segregation bins, but to no avail. Garbage is yet to be recycled and reused for income generation. Primary Source: NGO Forum Secondary Source: The Himalayan Times
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	:: GLOBAL NEWS ::

	BPD BLOG-LEARNING FORM FAILURE IN SANITATION 11^thSanitation Community of Practice (SanCop) meeting: learning from failure in sanitation Aliki Zeri for BPD Water and Sanitation What do we mean when we talk about ‘failure’? How can NGOs in the development sector and in particular in the field of sanitation, use ‘failure’ as a learning mechanism? Is it prudent to ‘market’ ‘failure’ and if so is there a right way of doing it? These were just a few of the questions the 11^th SanCop, which was held on the 14^th of November 2012 at WEDC (Loughborough University), strived to answer. ‘Strive’ appears undoubtedly to be the right word, since after considerable debate a number of issues still remained unanswered. And although this may be perceived by some as a ‘failure’, for me it represents a clear indication of the meeting’s success. Bringing together more that 40 academics, engineers, NGO representatives and sanitation experts the meeting provided a ‘safe space’ where ‘failure’ was recognised and embraced as part of the development-aid organisations’ learning curve. Is there are difference between ‘lessons learnt’ and ‘admitting failure’? ‘Failure’, ‘lessons learnt’, ‘learning opportunities’ and ‘learning return’ were used interchangeably by participants throughout the debate; illustrating the difficulty of defining the precise context and the ambit of this concept. Is in fact the term ‘lessons learnt’ radically different from the term ‘admitting failure’? Participants appeared to think so. The former was perceived as indicating a backward-looking process, a mechanism of revisiting a project/programme and assessing what went wrong. On the contrary, an ‘admission of failure’ is associated with a process of learning which is embedded within the project’s/programme’s structure, allowing implementers to constantly re-assess the project/programme and adapt it to changing and often unforeseen circumstances. Reassessing perceptions of failure Within these context participants were implicitly prompted to reassess their perceptions of ‘failure’. The commonly shared understanding that, a failed project or programme means that potential beneficiaries are no worse off than they were before the intervention took place, was accordingly challenged. The need to “reframe the public image of development” (traditionally perceived as something that is inherently benign and could therefore have no negative effect) was commonly agreed. Incentives and disincentives of recognizing failure Having recognized the malleability of ‘failure’ as a concept, participants shifted their attention to the incentives and disincentives of recognizing ‘failures’ – the fear of displeasing donors and the associated ‘competition for a piece of the donor pie’ appeared to be the main concerns. Could EWB Canada’s ‘safe spaces’ counteract these disincentives? And more generally could they provoke a fundamental change in the ‘donor culture’, one that would result in donors not only actively promoting an honest reflection of what is not working, but also rewarding NGOs that are openly admitting their failures? The dilemma of marketing failure in WASH Building a ‘safe space’ across the development sector (the WASH sector included) is unarguably challenging; expanding this ‘space’ outside this limit is expected to be even more difficult. ‘Marketing failure in WASH’ was the title BPD Water and Sanitation chose for its discussion group. Is it indeed advisable or even prudent for NGOs to ‘market’ (i.e. communicate) their ‘failures’ to the public? Could Bellemare’s cynical argument that: “admitting failure is the not-for-profit world equivalent of corporate social responsibility in the for-profit world” be the answer to this question? As Terence argues: “if you’re the first NGO trying to do it you’ll find yourself at the sharp end of a ‘first penguin to leap off the ice sheet’ type collective action dilemma (i.e. it’s the first penguin that has the highest chance of getting chomped by the sea lions). Who’s going to keep giving money to the one NGO that’s forever feeding journalists with stories of what it did wrong?” Even though there is some truth in this argument, it is equally true that: “the more people who are honest about how challenging the work is and how rife it is with failures – not because of incompetence but because we are courageously taking on some of the most complex and dynamic problems- the more the public will see the admission of failure as a sign of transparency, humility and learning/innovation cultures and not as a sign of weakness.” An encouraging first step in the ‘development-aid failure’ debate Acknowledging the novelty of the issue and the breadth of arguments that could be raised within each of the aforementioned themes is unarguably the first step in engaging the sanitation sector with the ‘development-aid failure’ debate. Taking this first step within the context of the 11th SanCop, was for me a particularly challenging, yet fulfilling experience. The high-level of discourse, the enthusiasm and commitment of all participants, not only during the formal sessions but also during the breaks and the group-discussions was indeed admirable. In this sense, the participants’ promise to revisit the issue in the future SanCops was particularly encouraging. Source: Sanitation Updates OVER ONE THOUSAND “HACKERS” FIND 181 NEW APPS TO IMPROVE ACCESS TO SAFE SANITATION FOR POOR PEOPLE WASHINGTON, December 5, 2012 - More than a thousand computer programmers and other information technology specialists in 40 cities around the world developed 181 new application software, or apps, this past weekend to help improve access to safe sanitation for the 2.5 billion poor people who lack it. The "hackers" competed for 48 hours in the first ever global Sanitation Hackathon. The need for innovative solutions to the chronic lack of sanitation worldwide is immense. Of those people who lack access to improved sanitation, 1.1 billion have no facilities at all and defecate in the open. These sanitation shortages account for thousands of deaths daily, especially among children. Additionally, poor sanitation costs billions of dollars in economic losses annually, as high as 7 percent of GDP in some countries. "That's billions of dollars that could educate poor children or help build infrastructure - like schools and roads," said World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim. Conversely, more than 6 billion people worldwide have access to a mobile phone, including in rural and urban areas in developing countries. The surge in mobile phones in Africa - some 94 percent of urban Africans, for example, are near a GSM signal - is transforming the way people complete daily tasks, from knowing when to sell farm commodities, to finding easier ways to pay bills or send money to family and friends. With ever increasing mobile penetration and falling prices of smart phones, mobile applications provide a platform to address myriad critical issues and an opportunity to solve problems in the developing world. "Across the word in places where people do not have access to sanitation, we see those people with cell phones," said Rachel Kyte, World Bank Vice President for Sustainable Development. "The barriers to accessing sanitation are many and varied. Technology is not a silver bullet, but we wanted to find out whether for example mobile or location based technologies could remove any of those barriers. It turns out they can." The global Sanitation Hackathon, as the 2011 Water Hackathon before it, follows the model set by Random Hacks of Kindness (RHoK), in which subject matter experts and local stakeholders submit problem statements which are then tackled by volunteer software developers who use the latest technology tools to create innovative solutions. The first RHoK event in November 2009 gave rise to applications such as I'm Ok! and Tweak the Tweet, which were used in emergency response operations following the 2010 Haiti earthquake. One of the new apps developed over the weekend, called "Mapsh," could enable the government of India to more easily verify communities that have achieved open-defecation free (ODF) status, for which villages are rewarded as part of the country's Total Sanitation Campaign. Mapsh is designed to use a mobile crowd-sourcing tool to assist in the verification process of ODF communities. Other apps tackled behavior-change challenges to sanitation and hygiene problems, such as using mobile educational games to begin changing the attitudes and practices among children related to hand washing. Another app developed over the weekend is an SMS- and location-based system that tracks pit latrine/septic tank-emptying in Accra, which will help improve the efficiency of the collection process and the accountability of the disposal process (tracking of truck movements and illegal dumping). In a video welcome message, Dr. Kim told the hackers their expertise could impact the lives of the world's poorest people. "With your help, we want to tackle this massive challenge. The availability of mobile phones is a game changer because of mobile technology, which has created enormous opportunities. We believe there are technological solutions that can help us provide sanitation for more poor people and can save more children from preventable diseases. You could be the very people who create the tools for a solution that helps families, villages and maybe whole countries to tackle the sanitation challenge at a large scale." The next phase, the online "Hack at Home" sanitation app challenge (www.sanitation.hackathome.com ), raises the bar and increases the sense of competition from the local level to the global level. It enables hackers who created apps this past weekend to continue working on their prototypes with the support of global online mentors, towards apps that are stable and ready for deployment. The challenge will culminate in a spring 2013 awards ceremony. The Sanitation Hackathon was organized by the World Bank Group in partnership with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Random Hacks of Kindness (RHOK), Eirene, UNICEF, and many other partners at local sites, such as Blackberry, Google Developers, IBM, Infosys, Microsoft, Nokia, Sprint, and Unilever. The Sanitation Hackathon took place in: Atlanta, Cape Town, Dakar, Dar es Salaam, Dhaka, Hartford (CT), Helsinki, Jakarta, Kampala, Lahore, Lima, London, Los Angeles, Manila, Montreal, New York, Philadelphia, Pune, Sacramento, San Francisco, Seattle, Toronto, Vancouver, and Washington, DC. Another 28 satellite cities contributed through RHOK, the global and regional partners of which include Google, Microsoft, Yahoo!, NASA, HP, the World Bank, and DiUS (Australia). The first Water Hackathon was organized by the World Bank Group in 2011, in which nearly 1,000 registered IT professionals at 10 global locations developed apps for improving delivery of water services. Source: Water and Sanitation Program
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ENPHO E-Bulletin October-November 2012

EDITORIAL

October and November months were important months for WASH and Environmental sector in Nepal. On October 15 we once again celebrated Global Hand Washing Day and on 19 November World Toilet Day. Handwashing with soap is the most effective and inexpensive way to prevent diarrheal and acute respiratory infections, which take the lives of millions of children in developing countries every year. The Handwashing Day focuses on children because not only do they suffer disproportionately from diarrheal and respiratory diseases and deaths, but research shows that children the segment of society so often the most energetic, enthusiastic, and open to new ideas can also be powerful agents for changing behaviors like handwashing with soap in their communities. Global Handwashing Day was originally created for children and schools, but can be celebrated by anyone promoting handwashing with soap.


	Kathmandu Valley is building opportunities with eco-friendly technologies
	Development is a process of producing or creating something new or more advances. It is gradual growth of something so that it becomes more advance and stronger. The present world would be incomplete without all these development, which has changed the appearance of whole world. New ideas, new dreams, strong determinations of humans are fully supporting all these innovations. With these innovations, we are actually changing these cities to something diverse places. Along with change and development, momentum of urbanization increases which leads rural areas to change into semi-urban to urban. Rural to urban changes depends upon different factors like good lands, natural resources, trades, migration, development, facilities and opportunities. With urbanization land use changes, resource utilization has increased creating more employment opportunities. Every human being wants a better living standard than where they are now. Thus, urbanization amplifies the desires of rural people to move to the urban centers. Consequently, today’s world is experiencing continuous population growth especially at the urban areas. Development is mostly concentrated in the urban areas which intend to facilitate interaction between people and businesses, benefiting both parties in the process. There is a widely availability of all the infrastructures of development and also modern services like the internet and satellite communication facilities in the urban areas. Population growth is leading to all the resources problems including water, energy. With increasing population, the demands for every other resource required for survival increase. A time when the number in the population exceeds the natural resources available to sustain it, is termed as overpopulation. Over population leads to faster depletion of resources and also creates environmental problem. Sustainable development requires the implementation of appropriate environment friendly technologies which are both efficient and adaptable to local conditions. It allows improvement of livelihood while minimizes environmental destruction. Deforestation, water contamination, groundwater depletion and pollution, waste management are some of current environmental issues in context of Nepal. Today’s citizens are aware of these environmental issues. They are using different technologies including eco-friendly technologies and also trying to adopt these technologies into their day to day activities. Different stakeholders are involved in inventing and promoting these technologies. States, organization and civil societies all are actors for the development, holding respective responsibilities and duties. Coordination between all these three actors is required to develop the whole nation. In coordination with different governmental bodies and international organization, different local organizations have been conducting different programs promoting these technologies under different community development projects. ENPHO is also providing its service continuously since 1990. ENPHO is service-oriented scientific, national non-governmental organization that envisages contributing sustainable community development by combing research and actions through the integrated programs in the areas of environment and public health. ENPHO runs a government accredited laboratory and promote eco-friendly technologies such as SODIS, ECOSAN toilets, rainwater harvesting and waste water treatment through reed bed systems. ENPHO with aim of creating eco societies and promoting eco-friendly living for sustainable planet is conducting research and developing appropriate eco-friendly technologies that are acceptable to local communities. It is also demonstrating eco-friendly technologies and practices; developing and implementing effective strategies to promote eco-friendly technologies; implementing community development programs by networking with partners for coordination and advocacy and enhancing organizational capacity. From very beginning, we had faced different changes and got different chance to prove our existence. We still need more development but with sustainable and eco-friendly approaches. We should remember that we are not the only generation that will survive here. So, let’s explore new vicinity for developing all these technologies, let’s change cities and create opportunity that takes development, sustainability and environment friendly together with it. - By Merina Shakya, ENPHO/Paschim Paaila
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	:: ENPHO NEWS ::

	ORIENTATION PROGRAM ON POU With the objective to aware community people about different household water treatment systems, especially bio-sand filter, an orientation program was organized from 10-12 October, 2012 at three different communities of ward no. 2 and 5 of Gorkha Municipality. The program was organized in different three places and there were almost 30 participants in each orientation program. The Five days Bio-sand filter Construction Training was organized at Gorkha Municipality-ward no. 5, Khirepani on 4 - 11 November 2012. The objective of training was to develop local entrepreneurship for the effective promotion of Household Water Treatment System (HWTS) and to construct the Bio-sand Filter. That was complete mason training in which there were four participants, among them one was community mobilizer and other three were local entrepreneur of Bio-sand Filter. Most of participants said that the training was very useful to them and their community too. “Before this training, we were unknown about the quality of water that we are drinking, its consequences and the preventive measures of those but after this training we are able to know the importance of safe water and also about the different household water treatment methods with new technology i.e. bio-sand filter” said Kamala Thapa, participant of the training. Both orientation and Training was organized by ENPHO in collaboration with Centre for Affordable Water and Sanitation Technology (CAWST).

	MOBILE HANDWASHING STATION AT SURKHET Handwashing with soap is the most effective and inexpensive way to prevent diarrheal and acute respiratory infections, which take the lives of millions of children in developing countries. This year, with slogan “Help a child rich the age of 5” Global Handwashing Day-2012 was celebrated at Birendranagar municipality, Surkhet in coordination with Birendranagar Municipality, Health post and local CBOs dated on 15^th October 2012. A joint handwashing program was setup at three different places and the program was started from Mr. Yamlal Dhakal, Chief Executive Officer, Birendranagar Municipality washing hands with soap in proper step. A mobile vehicle was arranged and handwashing station was run to different places in which 3 ENPHO staffs including 5 volunteers demonstrated the proper handwashing step and taught local people the importance of handwashing in critical time. “Today I am really happy because today I learned to wash my hands with proper techniques along with its benefits and I will transfer this knowledge to my family and community- said Monika Acharya, a local community woman. More than 500 people directly got sensitization on importance of handwashing with proper steps.

	CELEBRATION OF GLOBAL HAND WASHING DAY ENPHO in coordination with Drinking Water and Sanitation Division Office; Bhaktapur , Jhaukhel VDC, Jhakuhel drinking water and sanitation users’ committee celebrated the Global Handwashing Day at Jhaukhel VDC on 15^th October,2012. With the slogan “Wash Hand, Safe from Disease”; the day was celebrated with the mass rally all around from the 4 Government schools of Jhaukhel VDC and the community from all wards. Mr. Rajendra Kumar KC, LDO of District Development Committee, Bhaktapur has participated as a chief guest during the program. Similarly Mr. Ramchandra Sherchand, Division chief of DWSS and members of DWASHCC had attended as guests in that program. All together 300 participants has attended in the program. Global Hand washing day celebration was conducted every year with the motive of spreading knowledge on the importance of hand washing during the critical condition so that the death rate caused by the different diseases among under 5 years old children might decreased. Highlight of the program: Mass rally Street drama Handwashing competition among students of one student from the lower classes and one from the upper class from each of the Government schools. During the program street drama on the hand washing was shown. After that hand washing competition was held among students of one student from the lower classes and one from the upper class from each of the Government schools. Total 8 students have participated in the competition. In the competition, they have to run around 100m and the wash their hands properly with the six steps and return to their initial position. At the end, the prizes were distributed to the winners and the program was ended with the closing remarks given by Mr. Suresh Kumar Kafle.

	HAND WASHING DAY CELEBRATION BY YOUTH NETWORK With the theme “Help more children reach their 5th birthday”, 5^th Global Handwashing Day was celebrated with different activities from 13-15^th October, 2012 targeting school students of different places. In order to aware local people to be conscious and marking Global Handing Washing Day, Paschim Paaila organized Handwashing day special Hiking at Champadevi, Pharping and Changa Chet competition at White House Danda, KIrtipur which were the trekking route on 15^th October, 2012. Different Handwashing messages and slogans were written at the kite. 15 Youths participated at the hiking program. “This is a great idea to learn, share with such a fun” - said one of the participated hikers. On the same day, Ms. Merina Shakya, Network Coordinator and Mr. Buddha Bajracharya , Campaign Coordinator of Paschim Paaila shared on WASH issues and Handwashing techniques on “WASH Training” which was organized by Rotaract Club Jawalakhel at Sathi Ko Sath, an orphanage at Hattiban Lalitpur. There were altogether 53 children and the other members of Sathi Ko Sath at the program. Program was also conducted at Balmandir –Bal Sanrakchyan Griha, Siphal to demonstrate Handwashing technique & its importance and soap were also handed over for the Griha on 14^th October, 2012. Similarly, members of Paschim Paaila were involved on the Jhaukhel Drama and school awareness program on 15^th October, 2012.

	ICS TRAINING IN SURKHET ENPHO with close collaboration with Beautiful Nepal Association (BNA) conducted ICS training under Su-Swastha Project with the financial support from USAID and EAWAG/SANDEC at Koldhanda, Uttarganga VDC of Surkhet from 1-4^th November 2012. The overall objective of the training was to capacitate 6 local masons for ICS promotion within the SWASTHA communities. The participants were oriented on different types of ICS with their health impact. They were also provided with ICS making tools for scaling up the skill and local ICS promotion.

	WORLD TOILET DAY CELEBRATION VWASHCC members and the community members of Sahare VDC jointly collaborated with ENPHO to initiate and construct household toilets to the ultra-poor households on the occasion of World Toilet Day held on 19^th Nov 2012. The event was organized with the support of Su-Swastha project. Altogether 2 toilets at Sahare and 1 at Mehelkuna were constructed during the event within 18^th-21^st Nov 2012.

	DEMONSTRATION PLOT FOR URINE APPLICATION Urine application demonstration plot of Ecosan toilets has been established at the kitchen garden of Ms. Bal Kumari Bhandari, Ramghat-7. The plot will demonstrate the beneficial difference on farming products by using chemical fertilizer and urine fertilizer. The starting product that Ms. Bhandari has applied the urine fertilizer is on potato seeds in the area of 40 by 22 feet.

	TRAINING FOR JOURNALIST ON WASH The sanitation movement is going rapidly throughout the Nepal for achieving universal sanitation coverage by 2017. Government line agencies and other civil societies are working together to result concrete output in sanitation sector. In this regards, media are also playing remarkable role because journalist have a perfect profile for WASH advocacy since they communicate messages in a concrete way which reflects the WASH on the ground reality and influence the water supply and sanitation sector from grassroots level to policy level. With the objective of enhancing capacity of Journalist on WASH, ENPHO organized two days capacity development training for media personal on WASH in closed coordination with Birendranagar Municipality and Nepal Journalist Federation -Surkhet District chapter at Birendranagar Surkhet dated on 7-8 November 2012. All together 25 journalists’ form different 15 media of surkhet were participated in the training program. The training was focused to update the local journalist on global and national sanitation movement, MDG, national sanitation and hygiene master plan, WASH policy and strategy and application of online media in WASH sector. The training program was facilitated by ENPHO staff Mr. Kashi Kanta Thakur, Mr. Rajesh Adhikari and Mr. Giri Raj Khatri. Also, at the last day of the training, a media fellowship has been announced to provide recognition to those journalists who make public awareness of water, sanitation and hygiene. “The fellowship will be provided to four topmost selected journalist based on their news published in WASH”- said Mr. Durga Ghale- President, Nepal Journalist Federation- Surkhet chapter.

	SCHOOL TEACHERS EMPOWERED ON WASH ENPHO Organized three days WASH capacity development training for school teachers at Birendranagar Surkhet from 22^nd -24^th November 2012. The program was organized in closed coordination with Birendranagar Municipality under NWA project supported by Dutch WASH Alliance and WASTE-The Netherlands. All together 22 teachers from different 11 schools including municipality staff participated the training program. The training was facilitated by ENPHO’s Trainer Mr. Kashikant Thakur and Mr. Giri Raj Khatri. “we have got chance to learn lots of things on water, sanitation and hygiene issues and I will share this learning with my students and community and also this trainings motivate me to work further for raising awareness in WASH”- said Batuli Adhikari, Teachers from Shroswati Primary School. At closing day of the program Mr. Ramniwas Chaudhari, Regional Director, RMSO added few remarks relating the teacher’s role in sanitation movement. Similarly, one day’s refresher training was provided for TLOs and Mother groups focal persons from ward number 1, 2, 7 and 11. The refresher training was focused on group discussion followed by presentation. The group discussion was based on their initiatives for sanitation promotion, challenges faced during sanitation and possibl0e solution of the challenges. With the completion of group discussion, the discussion was facilitated by ENPHO staff.

	TRAINING ON URBAN DISASTER RISK MANAGEMENT With the objective to sensitize on disaster risk reduction in local context among community, two days training on Urban Disaster Risk Management (UDRM) for community people, DMC members, representatives of local government line agencies and schools were conducted at Yerawat Tole Reform committee, Dhapakhel, ward no 1, on 23 & 25 Nov 2012 and at Unicorn Welfare Society- Nepal, LSMC, ward no 14 on 27 - 28 Nov 2012. Similarly, 5 days training on Vulnerability and Capacity Assessment was conducted from 5^th - 9^th November 2012 at Hotel Sweet Home, Bhaktapur for community people of Lalitpur Sub Metropolitan City, ward no 5, Dhapakhel VDC, ward no 1 and Imadol VDC, ward no 6. 29 of targeted 30 participants (14 female, 15 male) from three communities were benefited by the training. It was believed that training will capacitate those volunteers for proper data collection.

	PRESENTATION/PARTICIPATION: Dr. Suman K. Shakya, Executive Director of ENPHO has participated and presented the paper in “2012 Water and Health Conference: Science, Policy and Innovation”, organized by University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, USA Oct 29 – 2 Nov 2012 Mr. Prajwal Shrestha, Program Manager, Mr. Rajendra Shrestha, Program Manager, Ms. Luna Kansakar, Project Officer and Ms. Yasoda Shrestha, Project Officer have participated and presented the paper in International Conference on Decentralized wastewater Management in Asia, Organized by IWA at Nagpur, India from 20 to 22 Nov, 2012.
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	:: LOCAL NEWS ::

	EVOLVE REGIONAL STRATEGY ON DRINKING WATER SUPPLY, SANITATION: WORLD BANK KATHMANDU, Oct 10: As unclean water and sanitation is the world´s second biggest killer of children, the World Bank official on Wednesday urged countries in South Asia to evolve out a common strategy to tackle this problem in the region. "Policy priority, insufficient funding, rapid urbanization and lack of public awareness have mainly impeded attainment of long-term sustainability of water supply and sanitation in South Asia," said Tahseen Sayed, World Bank country manager for Nepal. "Weak institutional capacities are other problems for us in the region to attain our goal of reducing number of people who do not have access to drinking water and sanitation," she stated. Sayed was speaking at the South Asian regional conference on drinking water and sanitation, which kicked off in Kathmandu on Wednesday. The three-day conference is being attended by more than 100 experts and officials from the different countries of the region. Through the conference, they hope to identify a common strategy to mitigate challenges seen in access to drinking water and sanitation in rural areas and also identify the workable institutional models for the region. According to the World Bank, more than 500 million people do not have access to sanitation and 250 million people to drinking water in South Asia, which is home to 1.6 billion people. "Despite its economic success, South Asia, now, represents the largest concentration of the world´s poor, as well as those lacking access to safe water and sanitation," said its statement. According to the Bank, the conference will discuss on identifying sustainable ways of water supply, increasing sanitation access and reducing challenges -- challenges of declining water quality and quantity. "It will also focus on developing partnership between public and private sector to advance rural water and sanitation," Sayed said. Janak Raj Shah, member of the National Planning Commission (NPC) said that the inadequate coordination among major players in the field of water supply and sanitation, weak implementation of the program and lack of proper approach to handle the projects were major hurdles of water supply and sanitation in Nepal. “ "We are lagging behind to achieve our targets under millennium development goals on sanitation and water supply," Shah said. The government has targeted to increase access to water supply and sanitation to 53 percent of the total population by 2015. Source: Republica INTEGRATION OF WATER SANITATION HYGIENE AND INDOOR AIR FOR HEALTHY LIFE Each year 1.5 million people die because of diarrhea and another 1.6 million people die because of indoor air pollution (IAP) globally. Water sanitation related diseases and indoor air pollution (IAP) are amongst the top killers in Nepal. 14700 people are dying each year because of unsafe water, lack of sanitation and unhygienic behaviors. There is another estimates that 12700 children under five die because of acute respiratory infection (ARI) and diarrheal disease annually due to poor hygiene and sanitation Similarly, 7500 people are dying each year due to IAP, a kitchen killer. Among these deaths, more than 50 percent are of age under 5. WASH (water, air, sanitation and hygiene) related diseases attributes for more than 10 percent death each year in Nepal. There is an estimate that about 10 billion Nepalese Rupees loss each year because of poor hygiene and environmental sanitation. Similarly, there is another estimate of about 10 billion Nepalese Rupees annual loss due to IAP. The project SWASHTHA (Strengthening Water, Air, Sanitation and Hygiene Treasuring Health) is therefore designed to contribute in reducing such losses through integrated WASH interventions in some urban and peri-urban areas of Nepal. SWASHTHA project focuses to improve the health and well being of the urban and peri urban settlements of Bharatpur, Butwal, Gulariya and Tikapur municipalities. The project is working in 19 communities in these four municipalities and 2 Village Development Committes (VDCs) of Chitawan district. The project also focuses on the few urban environmental problems of some neighboring municipalities and small towns like Ratnagar, Ramgram, Sidharthanagar, Sunawal, Bardaghat and Kawasoti. The four year (2009 – 2012) project is funded by European Union under its Non-State Actors in Development (NEPAL) programme and co-financed by UN-HABITAT’s Water for Asian Cities Programme. The project’s implementing partners are Municipal Association of Nepal (MuAN), Environment and Public Health Organization (ENPHO) and Practical Action Nepal Office as Non State Actors (NSA) and respective municipalities and VDCs as State Actors. The overall objective of the project is to improve health and wellbeing of vulnerable population especially, women and children residing in urban and periurban communities of project areas. The expected outcomes of the project are to reduce health cost through preventing WASH related diseases, creating clean environment and improved hygiene practice. Safe water is the first component of the project. Water should not only be safe in source but it should be safe till it is consumed. It is therefore important to deliver safe drinking water from its catchments to consumers (“in Nepali Mul Dekhi Mukh samma”). Low cost household water treatment options like boiling, chlorination, filtration and SODIS (solar disinfection) methods are promoted in project communities. Concrete platforms are constructed to avoid ground water source protection. Better sanitation is the second major component, where sanitizing faeces is a key facet. The project promotes low cost toilets as per the choice of households including single pit pour flush, wet ECOSAN, dry ECOSAN and bio gas attached toilets. Alongside, dish washing platform (Juthelno), dish drying rack (Chang) and cattle shed improvement are also promoted to better health outcomes. Use of local resources has been encouraged while promoting such interventions. Hygiene is the third component of the project. Local change agents like Female Community Health Volunteers (FCHVs), teachers and students are trained and mobilized to aware beneficiaries for safe hygiene practices. Kitchen management is the fourth component of the project. Major project interventions to reduce IAP are promotion of improved cooked stoves (ICS), ventilation improvement, bio gas and kitchen space management. Fifth and the last component of the project is waste management. The project has promoted 3R (reduce, reuse and recycle) principle in managing solid waste of project communities. Household and community composting are some of the major interventions under this component. Access of safe water is increased to the beneficiaries. Two communities have been declared as safe water community (SWC). The project with the support of local stakeholders are able to declare open defecation free (ODF) in 14 project communities out of 21. OD is significantly reduced in other remaining communities too. People have expressed that awareness on hygiene has increased and adopted safe hygiene practices accordingly. More than 300 FCHVs are trained on each component of the project and are mobilized in the project communities. Pollution level of indoor air in intervened households has reduced significantly. Similarly, awareness of waste management has also increased. Further, a community in Chitwan has been declared as SWASHTHA (Healthy) community after satisfactory interventions of all project components. Changing behavior of people is complex as change might be discomfort even it is better. Project has applied ignition participatory rural appraisal (IPRA) tools to trigger behavioral change. Despite of successes, it is to be mentioned that 5 to 10 percent toilet are still not being used properly, some water filters are already defunct, still some people do not wash hand properly, some installed ICS are not used and waste is not being managed properly. However in overall, there are visible positive changes in health of people in the project communities. It can be concluded that improvement on these five components definitely help to create a healthy home and with these healthy homes, a healthy community will form. There are some visible changes like reduction of diarrheal and smoke related diseases. FCHVs have expressed that use of rehydration medicine (Jivan Jal) has reduced significantly in project communities. Communities are cleaner because of reduction of OD and better waste management. Exact mapping of the outcomes will be revealed by health impact study being performed by an independent consultant. The study result will be measured against the baseline data taken before the project interventions in order to measure the success of the project and will be available by November 2012. Source : Practical Action blog
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	:: GLOBAL NEWS ::

	GETTING IT RIGHT : IMPROVING MATERNAL HEALTH THROUGH WATER, SANITATION AND HYGIENE. Some very basic elements of human development related to water, sanitation and hygiene that were accepted in the 19^th and early 20^th centuries are still unavailable to a large proportion of pregnant women in the 21^st century, write the authors of a new Simavi Each year 290,000 women die from complications during pregnancy, birth and the neonatal period; and, an estimated 10 to 20 million women suffer from related health complications. Almost 90% of the maternal deaths occur in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. Much of this is preventable through practices that have long been established. The Simavi study reviews published literature describing the impact of water, sanitation and hygiene on maternal health and mortality. Two studies showed significant correlations between increased access to water and sanitation and reductions in maternal mortality. Specific evidence was found relating to the impact of water carrying and water and sanitation-related infections on pregnant women, and to the impact of hygiene during and after delivery. However, relatively few high quality studies were found on the basis of which generalizations can be made about the specific linkages between water, sanitation and hygiene on the one hand and maternal health on the other. There was much more literature on the impact of hygienic practices during delivery on neonatal mortality. Clean delivery procedures are key to preventing neonatal deaths. Unhygienic practices during delivery that cause death of the newborn baby are also likely to have an impact on the health of the mother. Even though it is clear how important is for mothers to have access to safe water, sanitation and clean birthing, they often have little influence on expenditures and decisions that would improve these services. The study suggests that the educational/promotional aspects relating to WASH and (maternal and newborn) health should be improved and addressed from pregnancy up to child care. Similarly, health centres and hospitals should have running water, clean toilets, safe refuse disposal, clean beds and areas for deliveries. Consistent hygiene in clinics and hospitals should be ensured. More high-quality research is needed on the linkages between WASH and maternal health in the context of low-income countries. Source: Sanitation Updates SANITATION MARKETING LESSONS FORM CAMBODIA: A MARKET- BASED APPROACH TO DELIVERING SANITATION A new WSP field note, Sanitation Marketing Lessons from Cambodia: A Market-Based Approach to Delivering Sanitation, highlights that a market-based intervention can help increase sanitation coverage six times faster than the average increase in project areas. This makes sanitation marketing a promising approach for increasing sanitation at scale in rural Cambodia. Based on a detailed sanitation demand and supply chain assessment in 2006, WSP designed and supported a Sanitation Marketing Pilot Project in two provinces – Kandal and Svay Rieng. The project tests the applicability of a new market-based approach to strengthen the supply of affordable and aspirational toilets while introducing social marketing to generate toilet sales. Over a period of 16 months of project implementation by the NGO International Development Enterprises (IDE), more than 10,000 newly designed, low-cost pour-flush latrines – also known as "Easy Latrines" – were sold to rural households by local latrine producers through their network of commission-based sales agents. The increase of access to improved sanitation in the pilot provinces was not only attributable to the uptake of Easy Latrine; the promotion of the Easy Latrine also triggered uptake of other pour-flush latrines. In the areas with sanitation marketing activities, the increase of improved sanitation coverage was on average 7.7% compared to an increase of 1.1% outside the intervention areas. The pilot has shown promising results as well as areas for further refinement. For example, high sales did not translate immediately into high market penetration (or coverage of pour–flush latrines) at the village level, as sales often slowed down after "early adopters" were captured. The field note emphasizes the need for complementary interventions to reach various market segments, scale and depth of market penetration, and to accelerate access to improved sanitation. These include providing support to government in conducting intensive demand creation and behavior change communication programs as well as in improving the broader enabling environment for rural sanitation scale up. These and other evidence-based lessons from the pilot have fed into a larger scale follow-on project with partners to deepen the market-based sanitation approach in Cambodia. Source: WSP Report
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	:: ENPHO IN NEWS::


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	Environment and Public Health Organization G.P.O. Box 4102 110/25 Aadarsha Marg, Naya Baneshwor Kathmandu, NEPAL Phone: 977-1- 4468 641 / 4493 188 Fax: 977-1- 4491 376 Email: enpho@enpho.org Website: http://www.enpho.org

ENPHO E-Bulletin October/November 2011

EDITORIAL

In the month of October and November there are two important days; October 15th is Hand Washing Day and November 19th is World Toilet Day and this issue mainly focused on Hand Washing and Communal Sanitation issues. Communal or public sanitation is an important WASH issue, especially in high-density slums with a high proportion of tenants and frequent flooding and water-logging. The financing and sustainable management of communal public toilets is challenging. This issue also contains scale up activity of rainwater harvesting (RWH) as a source of drinking water and for other domestic uses. A recent study states that small-scale rainwater harvesting is one sustainable approach that is proving increasingly effective in both rural and urban settings in the developing world.

OUR HEALTH RELIES ON OUR OWN HANDS!

In this today’s world where people have already stepped into the moon, the mere fact that there is still the need of celebrating the global hand washing day may sound worthless to the people around. Likewise, there are many people who still have a belief, “What is the use of teaching people about cleaning their own hands?” When we look into this fact, we can figure out that why would not people belief this fact since there is no such religious texts which states the use of hand washing in our culture unlike others.

Looking to the fact, we know that it is a basic necessity to wash our hands and yes to some extent we have implemented it into our day to day life but there are many of us who just wet our hands rather than washing them properly. Wetting hands or washing hands only with the use of water does not have any sort of benefit but if we wash our hands correctly with the use of soap and water we can prevent 45% of diarrhea or other water borne diseases as proved by World Health Organization. The benefit of washing hands with soap and water does not only limits to this but it also helps prevents respiratory diseases. It is one of the most easiest, effective and cheap way of staying healthy. It is a most need of today’s world for Children, youths, adults, elderly and everybody to wash their hands properly with the use of soap and water. Having look upon various facts, they also suggest that the benefit of use soap and water to wash the hands prevents child mortality rate, Neo-natal mortality rate, diarrheal deaths and deaths due to respiratory diseases.

Before eating food, after using toilets, before cooking food, before feeding a child, after handling wastes and after cleaning the excreta of a child; it is mandatory to wash hands properly with soap and water at least for 20 seconds. Therefore, it is not useful to wash hands for a day but “not only for a day, wash hands every day.” We should all look to this phrase and follow it on our day to day life to have a healthy life. If we take these issues to the public, implement it in our daily life. Then only we can stay away from and decrease the rate of deaths due to poor sanitation and hygiene.

In conclusion, various national and international organizations, Government of Nepal and other organizations have initiated different types of programs/campaigns for 2011 in celebrating the global Hand Washing Day; Along with that we all need to implement it in our livelihood if we really wish to see the remarkable change. For that, not only October 15th but every day Global Hand Washing Day must be celebrated as our health relies upon our hands.

- By Ms. Kamala KC, ENPHO/"paschim paaila”

ENPHO NEWS

SURAJPUR CLUSTER DECLARED AS SAFE WATER ZONE

Surajpur cluster has declared ‘Safe Water Zone’ on 1st Kartik 2068 (17th October 2011) among a huge mass of people including representatives of Gulariya municipality, Nepal Redcross Society district chapter Bardiya, Dalit Welfare Organization, Armed Police, SWASHTHA team and local peoples. After distribution and use of 54 Kachan Arsenic filters and 26 Biosand filter, the community succeed to declare safe water zone. Now every household use Biosand or Kanchan Arsenic filter for drinking and cooking purpose.

Mr. Krishna Gautam, NRCS Bardiya congratulate and praised to be first ‘Safe Water Zone’ in Bardiya district. He also added that “continuous effort and high commitment is necessary to continue this announcement”. Mr. Laxman Giri and Khamba Prasad Gharti (President and Treasurer of Surajpur WASH improvement Coordination Committee) explained the steps of mission of Safe Water Zone and its challenges during distribution and use of filters. Moreover Mr. Geep Gharti, one of member of WASH improvement CC, said “this is second steps towards a model village”. The committee decided to handover the responsibility of monitoring of using filter to previous monitoring team which was formed to monitor use of toilet.

This is first safe water zone declaration in Bardiya district. This cluster was also declared ‘Open Defecation Free’ area before 15 months ago.

CONSTRUCTION OF HAND WASHING STATION AND SAFE DRINKING WATER ZONE

From 10th -14th October 2011, hand washing station and safe drinking water station was constructed in Pathivara Primary School as a part of WASH Resource Centre. The safe drinking water station with two tap was constructed which is connected with bio-sand filter and one taped hand washing station was also constructed. Directly, around 120 students were benefited from this construction.

SCHOOL WASH PROGRAM AT PATHIVARA

On 14th and 18th October 2011, the School WASH education program and WASH concern workshop were held on Pathivara Primary school and Shramik Shanti Higher Secondary School (SSHSS) respectively. In Pathivara School, the program was mainly organized on the occasion of Global Hand washing Day 2011 in which around 50 students knew the important of GHD, proper hand washing technique, different critical time of hand washing, important of hand washing etc.

HAND WASHING DEMONSTRATION AT DHULIKHEL BUSPARK

ENPHO in coordination with Dhulikhel Municipality and DWSS-Dhulikhel conducted a handwashing progrom on the occasion of Global Handwashing Day-11 at Dhulikhel buspark area. As the major target of the program was general public of Dhulikhel, more than 300 public made participated on the program. In the program, Establishment of handwashing station and demonstration were made. The program was got very interesting by the public.

ODF DECLARATION AT PAKUCHA

ENPHO and Give2Asia jointly declared Open Defecation Zone (ODF) 120 households (HHs) of Pakucha Community, Dhulikhel Municipality-1 on October 21, 2011. Dr. Suman K. Shakya, ENPHO and Mr. Bishwaraj Neupane, Dhulikhel Municipality participated on the declaration program. Villagers are very happy after declaring the community as ODF Community. “We will not defecate open onwards.” Villagers promised during the oath.

ORIENTATION WORKSHOP ON WATER FIELD TEST KIT

One day workshop was conducted on 24th October by ENPHO laboratory related to ENPHO Water Field Test Kit demonstration to bottled water manufacturing company owners and technicians. The major objective of this workshop was to give basic idea to the trainees of the bottled water companies about the drinking water quality, hands-on practice about how to operate and handle properly ENPHO water field test kit and inform of its scopes. All together seven mineral water companies participated on this workshop.

ORIENTATION TRAINING T0 COMMUNITY OF JHAUKHEL

ENPHO together with Jhaukhel drinking water and sanitation user committee has conducted 3 trainings on H&H, Latrine, SWM and PoU option of household drinking water treatment for the community of wards no 8 of Jhaukhel VDC on 24th, 31th October and 22nd November, 2011. Altogether 58 community people took participation on that training. The main objective of this training was to aware and give knowledge on water, health and sanitation. The importance of personal hygiene practice, types of latrines, safe drinking water through PoU options and household solid waste management were discussed during the training.

COMMUNITY SANITATION SENSITIZATION CAMPAIGN

Community sanitation sensitization campaign was launched on two communities of Kathmandu Valley in which the event were supported from ENPHO and UN-Habitat Urban Youth Fund. Different sorts of activities were conducted in Chyasal Community, Lalitpur and Pathivara Community, Kathmandu during June 6-9, 2011. The local Youth WASH Circle in coordination with youth clubs, CBOs, Mother Groups organized series of event. More than 500 people were aware through the documentary entitled 'Dhalmati'. Similarly, Community cleaning initiatives were launched in both communities for a week with active participation of youths and other community people. Different public place, street, schools were cleaned up.

INTER SCHOOL ART COMPETITION

Inter school art competition was held at Butwol and Gulariya Municipality at June, 7 and 9 as a part of environment day and sanitation week celebration. The competition was organized so as to make the student aware on environmental situation. Not having numbers of extra activities at school level, these students could not express their hidden talent and the event like this could certainly motivate them. 25 schools of Butwal have participated in a competition including 7 SLTS conducting schools of SWASHTHA Project of ENPHO.

CLEANING CAMPAIGN AND RALLY

Cleaning campaign was conducted at different schools and clusters of Bharatpur, Butwal, Gulariya and Tikapur. Around 300 community people have actively
participated in the campaign. Mass rally was also organized by Himali primary school at Gulariya to motivate people for constructing toilet. The rally was organized outside of the project clusters as numbers of toilets are yet to be constructed. Around 150 students and teachers participated in the campaign.

TRAINING ON CLTS, HEALTH AND HYGIENE

On June 13-17, 2011, 5 days’ TOT on “Community Led Total Sanitation (CLTS) for 3 days and Health & Hygiene” for 2 days was conducted at Sweet home, Bhaktapur with support from WAN organized by environment and public health Organization (ENPHO) coordinate with Jhaukhel User committee and Jhaukhel VDC.

WASH ORIENTATION PROGRAM AT MEHELKUNA VDC, SURKHET

In the theme of “Ek Ghar Ek Chrpi Mehelkunako Saan, Khula Disha Mukkta Chhetra Hamro Pahichan”, a one day orientation program for VWASHCC members was organized by Mehelkuna V.D.C. in support from Regional Monitoring and Supervision Office (RMSO), Surkhet on 29th June, 2011. Total participants were 35 including the people from VWASH members, RMSO and ENPHO.

PRESENTATION/PARTICIPATION:

Dr. Suman K. Shakya, Executive Director has participated at conference cum training in “WASH Conference 2011” organized by AusAID-Australian Government, University of Technology Sydney, Institute for Sustainable Future, Water Aid, International Water Forum and International Water center, Brisbane, Australia from May 16 – 20, 2011. Dr. Shakya has made a presentation on sanitation enhances quality of life through ecological sanitation toilet.
Ms. Sulochana Joshi, Coordinator of Regional Resource Center, Surkhet has participated in the Regional Sanitation Workshop from May 29-31, 2011 at Hotel Siddhartha, Nepalgunj. The main objective of the workshop was to review the sanitation movement carried out at Mid-west on the basis of Nepalgunj commitment and Surkhet declaration. Altogether 120 stakeholders from different regions have participated in the workshop and the workshop has declared 20 points declaration “Nepalgunj declaration” to meet national target of sanitation.
Ms. Biju Dangol, Senior Program Officer has participated in the Refreshment training on Water Quality and Water Safety Plan organized by Plan Nepal/ DNet from May 30-31 to June 1, 2011 at Yalamaya Kendra, PatanDhoka. She has made presentation on Household Drinking Water Treatment Options
Ms. Padmaja Shrestha, Senior Manager has participated in the training on Estimating Measurement uncertainty in routine analysis organized by NBSM from 29 June to 1st July, 2011.

LOCAL NEWS

NEPAL HAS STRONG HOPES FOR STRAW HOUSES TO RESIST EARTHQUAKES

May 4, 2011
Kathmandu, Nepal (IRIN) – As a country vulnerable to the next “big one”, people in Nepal are abuzz with an age-old, earthquake-resistant method of constructing buildings out of straw that could save lives, experts say. “We live in Kathmandu and everyone says it is rubble in the making,” said Ajaya Dixit, head of the Institute for Social and Environment Transition (ISET) in Nepal, an international organization leading in adaptive strategies for issues related to climate change and disaster risk reduction. Dixit has been spearheading a pilot straw-bale project and plans to break ground on Nepal’s first straw-bale building in May.

FIRST JOINT SECTOR REVIEW WORKSHOP CONCLUDED WITH JSR RESOLUTION

Lalitpur/May 6, 2011
Sector Efficiency Improvement Unit (SEIU) of the Ministry of Physical Planning and Works successfully organized the first Joint Sector Review (JSR) workshop from May 5-6, 2011 at Godavari Village Resort, Lalitpur. The Review workshop intended to bring together sector stakeholders, foster better coordination of shared goals and reflect on progress in water and sanitation delivery in Nepal to date. Similarly, the workshop aimed to strengthen leadership toward the achievement of the commonly agreed goals and move towards a shared vision of a coherent and achievable National Programme for Water Supply, Sanitation and Hygiene promotion.

53 MUNICIPALITIES LACK LANDFILL SITE

Friday, 20 May 2011
Kathmandu: Ministry of Local Development has stated that 53 among 58 municipalities in the country do not have well managed landfill sites. Owing to the lack of landfill sites, the municipalities have been dumping waste in ditches, rivers and public land. According to the ministry, only Kathmandu, Lalitpur, Pokhara, Ghorahi and Dhankuta have well managed landfill sites. Only five municipalities have well managed landfill sites in comparison to other municipalities, said Dinesh Thapaliya, Spokesperson at the ministry of local development.

GLOBAL NEWS

ONE MAN’S VISION

May 5, 2011
Working alongside Sir Richard Branson on special projects such as Virgin Galactic, Virgin Cruises and Virgin Casinos is all in the past for Ashley Stockwell, once the Virgin Group’s top marketer.

His claims to fame include being on the original Virgin Cola team in 1994 and creating the “Pammy” bottle based on the figure of Baywatch star Pamela Anderson, as well as coming up with Virgin Atlantic’s Heathrow Clubhouse lounge. But after 19 years occupying top roles with the company, Stockwell has taken his career in a new direction and, following a period of what can best be described as soul searching, is now nurturing the Global Ethics-owned One brand.
Source:http://www.marketingweek.co.uk/analysis/cover-stories/one-man%E2%80%99s-vision/3026008.article

HAITY’S CHOLERA MISERY: 5000 DEAD – AND UN PEACEKEEPERS TO BLAME

Friday, 6 May 2011
Five thousand dead, 300,000 ill, and a medical emergency that has already lasted six months; now the people of Haiti have someone to blame for the cholera outbreak which has swept through their earthquake-ravaged country: the blue-helmeted peacekeepers of the United Nations. An official report into the ongoing epidemic, which began last October, has concluded that it was almost certainly caused by a poorly constructed sanitation system installed at a rural camp used by several hundred UN troops from Nepal.
Source: The Independent

FOURNDATION TRY TO LEGITIMATE INDIA’S ‘INVISIBLE ENVIRONMENTALIST’

May 16, 2011
Sarasa Satish is a waste picker. Every morning, she starts promptly at 8:30 a.m. going door to door, collecting throwaway materials from houses in the Rajendra Nagar slums of Bangalore, India.

The neighborhood is crowded, with an average of about five people packed into each of its 4,000 households. Most are poor; some don't have running water. A typical workday ends with her sorting out the recyclable material once she's dumped the rejects, or non-recyclable waste. A few years ago, she would most likely have done that in a cramped alleyway. But now she segregates the remaining plastics, paper and compostable material in a small neighborhood center built by CHF International, a humanitarian aid organization once called the Cooperative Housing Foundation. It has a large presence in developing countries.
Source:http://www.nytimes.com/cwire/2011/05/16/16climatewire-foundations-try-to-legitimize-indias-invisib-79578.html?pagewanted=all

WATER, SANITATIN AND HYGIENE THE PRIORITY AT WHO GENEVA ASSEMBLY

May 18, 2011/Ifham Nizam
Water, sanitation and hygiene will be given top priority for the first time when senior officials on the World Health Organisation meet in Geneva for a discussion this week.

International development agency WaterAid, in a resolution, made the plea to give priority to sanitation and water and adopt measures to arrest and prevent the spread of cholera. This is due to be discussed and approved at the Assembly in Geneva. WaterAid South Asia’s Policy Advisor Mustafa Talpur told The Island yesterday that the Assembly provided a vital opportunity to achieve real progress in public health through improving the availability of clean water, better sanitation and hygiene. "It is the first time that a discussion on the role of water, sanitation and hygiene in health will be undertaken.
Source: http://www.island.lk/index.php?page_cat=article-details&page=article-details&code_title=25694