Project Description

1. Pakistan is nationally and internationally committed to provide water, sanitation and hygiene services and facilities to all. The said commitment has been made in national sanitation policy 2006 & Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) No 6 and Goal No 4, which are related to availability of water and sanitation for all and inclusive & equitable quality education. In order to honor the said commitment as well as realizing the need and importance of water, sanitation and hygiene WASH in school (WinS) UNICEF in consultation with Ministry of Federal Education and Professional Training, provinces and federating units initiated formulation of WASH in Schools (WinS) strategy in 2015.
2. The said strategy plan covers all the ten important components of a development plan such as situation analysis, goals, objectives and targets; strategies to achieve the objectives and targets; actions and activities to complete the strategy; and performance and evaluation indicators; possible risks and bottlenecks; cost estimates and output/outcome.
3. The situation analysis indicates that in Sindh 49% male primary schools, 46% female primary schools; 30% male middle schools, 30% female middle schools; 7% male high schools and 4% female high schools do not have latrines. Similarly 53% male and 54% female primary schools; 40% male and 38% female middle schools; and 16% male and 13% female high schools do not have drinking water facilities. Students/learner curriculum though incorporates concepts of health, hygiene, and sanitation in some subjects but these concepts, knowledge and skills are grossly inadequate to bring about a possible change in students about WASH Besides, WASH is not given due emphasis in pre and in-service teacher training. Overall the situation regarding WASH in Sindh public schools in not encouraging.
4. The objectives and targets of the strategic plan, interalia, include creating awareness, providing latrines where already not available and provision of drinking water by 2022.
5. The strategies to achieve the objectives and targets are (I) Preparation of WASH in School policy and planning guideline (II) Creating awareness amongst children, teachers and community about health, hygiene and sanitation (III) Construction of latrines (IV) Provision of drinking water in schools where not available (V) Ensure operation and maintenance of WinS facilities (VI) Address the cross cutting issues, such as latrines for persons with disabilities and Menstrual Hygiene Management (MHM) facilities (VII) WASH in School behavior of school children. In order to complete the proposed strategies number of actions and activities have been proposed.
6. Implementation framework of the plan focuses on timeframe (scheduling of the main strategies/activities); performance evaluation indicators which will be applied to monitor and evaluate implementation of plan activities. Estimated cost for each of the strategic plan has been calculated and indicated. The total estimated cost of the Sindh plan comes out to be around 24.6 billion rupees. The major cost is on construction of latrines i.e. 16.94 billion followed by drinking water i.e. 7 billion and crosscutting issues i.e. 700 million rupees.
7. The plan includes the effective system and mechanism, supervision and evaluation. The strategies for M&E include on site supervision and monitoring by Joint monitoring teams; generation and sharing of periodic progress reports; and district, provincial and national level implementation review workshop. The proposed evaluation includes the baseline, interim & summative evaluation. Besides it has also been proposed to develop and integrate wash indicators in EMIS.
8. The major outputs/outcomes of the plan interalia include availability of latrines and safe drinking water in all the public sector primary, middle and high schools of Sindh by 2022 (100% coverage); awareness raised about WASH and attitude of children positively changed; operations and maintenance mechanism is in place; cross cutting issues such as availability of latrines for persons with disabilities and menstrual hygiene management issues are addressed. Besides opportunities for earning of livelihood explored which will alleviate the poverty to some extent. Furthermore, the overall status of sanitation and hygiene will be improved. As a result water related infectious diseases such as Cholera, typhoid, and dysentery will be controlled.