Patrick Meehan. The WASH Sector in Myanmar: Addressing the Challenge of Building Sustainable WASH Services

Transcription

1 Patrick Meehan The WASH Sector in Myanmar: Addressing the Challenge of Building Sustainable WASH Services 1

2 Table of Contents Executive Summary... 3 Acronyms... 5 Glossary of Terms... 5 Introduction... 7 Chapter 1: An overview of the WASH Sector in Myanmar... 9 Introduction... 9 A. Country Overview... 9 B. WASH Coverage C. The WASH Sector Chapter 2: Challenges facing the building of sustainable WASH services in Myanmar Introduction A. Underlying challenges A1. Acute poverty A2. Weak institutional foundations A3. The operational environment A4. The challenge of community mobilisation and establishing effective community-based management A5. The challenge of facilitating behaviour change B. Weaknesses in donor and NGO practices B1. Donor frameworks and the prioritisation of a humanitarian aid approach B2. Weaknesses in the way NGOs work Conclusion Chapter 3: Addressing the challenges of sustainability in the WASH services in Myanmar Introduction Part 1: Improving sustainability of WASH services at the community level Part 2: Creating a supportive national framework for the development of sustainable WASH services Conclusion Annex 1: Understanding Sustainability: An analysis of how to develop sustainable WASH services

3 Executive Summary This report is designed to assist NGOs and donors working in the WASH sector in Myanmar to improve how they currently operate in order to ensure that their efforts to improve access to water and sanitation enjoy greater sustainability and are thus able to have a lasting impact. The WASH sector in Myanmar currently stands at something of a crossroads. There is strong determination amongst UN agencies and NGOs to utilise the momentum that has been gained following the response to Cyclone Nargis to launch a far more committed effort to achieve sustainable rural development, not just in the Delta region but right across the country. However, there is also concern amongst those working in the sector that declining levels of funding is starting to impede their ability to improve access to water and sanitation in Myanmar. There is no doubt that the need and demand for improved WASH services in Myanmar is huge and that NGOs have the potential to make a very positive difference. However, at the same time as there are calls for greater funding to be made available, there must also be an honest appraisal of the challenges facing the sector and weaknesses within current approaches to WASH service provision so that future funding will have a more sustained impact. Many NGO interventions in the WASH sector have enjoyed only limited sustainability. This report argues that this is partly attributable to the fact that Myanmar remains an extremely challenging environment within which to develop sustainable WASH services. NGOs are confronted with acute levels of poverty, a sector that has weak institutional foundations, limited levels of knowledge about hygiene, deeply ingrained attitudes and practices that perpetuate unhygienic behaviour, and extensive practical challenges (such as poor communication links and huge linguistic and cultural diversity). However, the report further argues that the limited sustainability of external interventions is also a result of weaknesses in the way donors and NGOs currently operate, which have prevented these challenges from being addressed adequately of have inadvertently exacerbated them. External interventions in the sector continue to be dominated by a top-down supplydriven approach to service delivery, which focuses primarily upon providing communities with water and sanitation hardware (latrines, handpumps, rehabilitated ponds etc). Inadequate consideration has been given to the importance of software aspects of service delivery, namely the promotion of community-led development strategies, capacity building initiatives to equip communities with the skills needed to manage services by themselves, and behaviour change facilitation to ensure that improved access to WASH services is matched by improved hygienic behaviour. Short funding timeframes and the emphasis upon increasing coverage as quickly and as widely as possible has often meant that this software is not properly implemented and as a consequence the ability of services to provide lasting benefits is limited. NGOs and donors must acknowledge that building sustainable WASH services requires more than ensuring the resilience of the hardware that is installed. It requires a holistic approach which embraces the importance of all aspects of sustainability, 3

4 namely the technical/functional, financial, social, institutional and environmental sustainability of the service. This report seeks to provide donors and NGOs with a clear overview of why WASH services in Myanmar often have only limited sustainability. It outlines why building sustainable services in Myanmar is challenging and also explains why donor and NGO strategies have at times been ill-equipped to properly manage and overcome these challenges. It argues that the foundations for building sustainable services lie in a better understanding of the challenges of working in Myanmar but also an acknowledgement amongst donors and NGOs that changes in the way they operate are needed. Finally, the report argues that improving the sustainability of WASH services in Myanmar requires a dual process that addresses weaknesses in the WASH sector and current NGO and donor approaches to WASH provision at both the community level and the national level. The report offers a set of ten detailed recommendations for how to address these weaknesses at both the community and national level. This report is the result of two and a half months of research conducted in Myanmar in April, May and June It is based on information collected from over forty meetings with an array of INGOs, LNGOs and UN agencies working in the WASH sector in Myanmar and from the internal documents, such as KAP studies and project Evaluation Reports, which numerous NGOs were willing to allow provide access to. 4

5 Acronyms CBO CLTS DRR FAO FSWG INGO KAP LNGO M&E MDG MIMU MOU NGO ODA OECD PONREPP TCG UNICEF VPDC WASH WTG Community-based organisation Community-led total sanitation Disaster risk reduction Food and Agriculture Organisation (of the United Nations) Food Security Working Group International non-governmental organisation Knowledge, attitudes and practices Local non-governmental organisation Monitoring and evaluation Millennium Development Goal Myanmar Information Management Unit Memorandum of Understanding Non-governmental organisation Overseas development assistance Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development The Post-Nargis Response and Preparedness Plan Tri-partite Core Group United Nations Children s Fund Village Peace and Development Council Water, sanitation and hygiene WASH thematic group Glossary of Terms Community- An organisation established within a community that is responsible for based organisation the ongoing management of a service. Hardware Software Exit Strategy Memorandum of The physical infrastructure of a water or sanitation system, such as pipes, pumps, rainwater collection tanks, toilets etc. Activities which develop the knowledge and skills needed to manage a service and to mobilise individuals to use a service in a way that will lead to lasting benefits. This includes building the technical capacity within communities to operate and repair hardware and to develop the skills needed to manage the service, such as accounting and bookkeeping. It also includes activities which promote positive behaviour change. Ensuring that a service will continue to function one an NGO leaves. This is often dependent upon sound installation of resilient hardware and the establishment of competent community level management structures. An exit strategy may include provisions for an NGO to offer some form of ongoing support to a community, such as covering costs for major repairs or providing periodic training programmes. Agreement between an NGO and the Government of the Union of 5

6 Understanding Monitoring and Evaluation Community-led Total Sanitation Life-cycle costs KAP study Myanmar. The MOU outlines the responsibilities of the NGO and the government, stipulates which townships and village tracts an NGO is able to work within, and requires the NGO to state its financial commitment to the project(s) it will undertake in these areas. Report conducted by NGOs to assess whether a project has achieved its goals and what lessons have been learnt. Participatory Monitoring and Evaluation includes input from service users about the quality of a service. An approach to improving sanitation practices which focuses on mobilising communities to abandon open defecation, rather than by employing a top-down approach to latrine construction through the offering of subsidies. Communities are encouraged to completely abandon open defecation and so achieve Open Defecation Free (ODF) status. The costs required to ensure that a service can continue to function indefinitely. This includes, not only the costs required to initially construct the service but also the costs required to operate and maintain the service (such as the cost of repairs and buying new materials) and to cover all software costs, such training and materials required to manage the service. Knowledge, Attitudes and Practices Study - study conducted by NGOs to assess existing levels of knowledge about water, sanitation and hygiene within a particular community, such as how to treat water and how diseases are transmitted. It also allows an NGO to gain a better understanding of prevailing attitudes regarding these issues and everyday practices surrounding personal hygiene, handwashing and disposal of waste. KAP studies may be conducted before a project to so that an NGO can gain a better understanding of the context within which it is to work and once a project is completed to assess the impact of an NGO s work. 6

7 Introduction Myanmar is one of the poorest countries in the world. Much of the population are without access to safe water and sanitation and waterborne diseases are a major cause of illness and death, especially amongst small children. Acute water shortages across parts of the country leave many communities extremely vulnerable and often forces households to borrow money in order to purchase water, locking them into a downward spiral of poverty. Following Cyclone Nargis, which struck Myanmar in May 2008, the number of NGOs (both local and international) working to improve access to water and sanitation has grown rapidly. The Nargis response effort has led to a vast increase in levels of knowledge and capacity amongst NGOs working to improve access to water and sanitation. Increased exposure to daily life in Myanmar has also improved awareness about the country s acute poverty and the negative impact on people s lives caused by the lack of safe water and sanitation. As a consequence many working within the sector advocate the need for a longer-term perspective, calling for greater funding to support the provision of basic services and for NGOs to player a greater role in the country s development. This Report assesses the role that NGOs and donors may be able to play in developing sustainable WASH services in Myanmar. It outlines the major challenges currently undermining the sustainability of WASH services in Myanmar and provides detailed recommendations for how these challenges should be addressed. These recommendations are primarily directed towards NGOs and donors currently working in the sector or those considering doing so in the future. The ultimate aim of this Report is to encourage greater consideration for how to develop stronger foundations for the WASH sector in Myanmar so that in the future more of the population will be able to enjoy the benefits of having ongoing access to safe water and sanitation. Structure of the Report The Report is divided into three chapters and an annex. Chapter One provides a brief overview of the current state of the WASH sector in Myanmar. It is primarily designed to act as an introduction for those who are not well acquainted with the current state of WASH in Myanmar and will provide little new information for those already with experience working in the sector. The chapter is divided into three sections. The first offers a brief introduction to Myanmar, the second provides an explanation of current levels of WASH coverage and the third gives an overview of the current state of the WASH sector. Unicef are in the process of compiling a new WASH Sector Review, the first since 1993, and this will provide a much more in-depth analysis of many of the issues touched upon in this chapter. Chapter Two provides a detailed analysis of the many factors which currently undermine the ability of water and sanitation services in Myanmar to deliver lasting benefits. The factors are divided into two groups: underlying challenges, i.e. existing challenges in Myanmar that have made it very difficult for NGOs to build strong foundations for sustainability; and weaknesses in donor and NGO approaches to service provision, which have meant that these existing challenges have not been adequately addressed or have been inadvertently exacerbated. 7

8 Chapter Three offers a set of ten detailed recommendations for how to address the challenges outlined in Chapter Three and so improve the sustainability of WASH services in Myanmar. It is argued that the sustainable development of WASH services in Myanmar will require a dual strategy in which NGOs and donors look both to ensure that their interventions are committed to strengthening sustainability at the community level, and to consider ways in which they can support the development a more supportive national framework for the development of WASH services, within which communities can enjoy a far greater degree of external support. These recommendations are primarily directed towards NGOs and donors. Annex One provides a detailed analysis of how to develop sustainable WASH services. It is designed to provide guidance for those within the sector who wish to re-assess the way they approach the issue of sustainability. It offers three inter-related frameworks to help guide service providers in their efforts to improve the sustainability of their work. These three frameworks are designed to encourage a more systematic and comprehensive commitment to sustainability both in Myanmar and beyond. Methodology This report is the result of two and a half months of research conducted in Myanmar in April, May and June It is based on information collected from over forty meetings with an array of INGOs, LNGOs and UN agencies working in the WASH sector in Myanmar and from the internal documents, such as KAP studies and project Evaluation Reports, which numerous NGOs were willing to allow provide access to. Most NGO staff interviewed for this report were refreshingly candid about their experiences working in Myanmar, highlighting current weaknesses in how both they and the sector as a whole currently functions, as well as offering their insights into how performance could be improved. However, almost all did so on the condition of anonymity. This report respects that wish, acknowledging the ongoing sensitivity surrounding development work in Myanmar. As a consequence many of the examples used to demonstrate points made in the report remain necessarily vague, whilst citations are only provided for quotations from reports that are widely available on the internet and not for internal NGO documents. 8

9 CHAPTER 1 An overview of the WASH Sector in Myanmar Introduction It is beyond the scope of this Report to provide an exhaustive assessment of how the WASH sector functions, especially regarding national policy and institutional frameworks, legal frameworks and how the government finances the sector. This chapter is instead designed merely to provide a brief overview of the WASH sector in Myanmar in order to provide some contextual background for the analysis of sustainability that follows in Chapter Two. The chapter is divided into three sections: A. Country overview B. WASH coverage C. The WASH Sector A much more rigorous analysis of the sector will be provided by the forthcoming UNICEF WASH Sector Review. A. COUNTRY OVERVIEW 1. Geography Myanmar, at the heart of southeast Asia, covers 261,218miles² and is almost three times the size of the UK. It shares a 1,362 mile border with China to the north-east, an 827 mile border with India and a 157 mile border with Bangladesh to the west and northwest. To the southeast Myanmar shares a small border (139 miles) with Laos and to the south and southeast shares a 1,302 mile long border with Thailand. The Indian Ocean forms a natural boundary to the west (Myanmar has a 1,414 mile coastline) creating a roughly kite-shaped country, with its tail trailing south. The major river in Myanmar is the Ayeyarwady (Irrawaddy) River, which snakes its way southwards from the Kachin Hills far in the north out to the Pacific Ocean where it forms a large delta. The Ayeyarwady creates a vast lowland valley throughout central Myanmar, surrounded by an impressive arc of highlands the cover much of Myanmar s borderland regions. Myanmar is commonly described as having five distinct regions: (i) the northern mountains which form the southern tip of the Himalayan foothills and contain Myanmar s highest peak, Hkakabo Razi (5,881m), in Kachin State; (ii) the western Arakan mountain range which runs south from Manipur in India through Rakhine State and includes the Naga Hills and Chin Hills; (iii) The Shan Plateau in eastern Myanmar, which has an average elevation of 1,000m; (iv) the Irrawaddy Basin which covers much of the central lowlands of the country; and (v) the long coastal belt that stretches down the country s western flank from Bangladesh in the North to Thailand in the South. 2. Climate Myanmar has a tropical monsoon climate, defined by three distinct seasons. The hot, dry premonsoon season extends from March to May, the heavy monsoon rains fall between May and October and this is followed by a cooler, dry season from November to February. The FAO 9

10 Map 1: Myanmar Source: 10

11 estimates Myanmar s average annual rainfall to be 2,341mm. 1 The coastal and mountain regions receive the most rainfall, averaging around 5,000mm. The Delta region receives about 2,500mm per annum and the central Dry Zone receives the least rainfall (500mm- 1000mm). This is partly because it is furthest from the coast but also because it lies in the rain shadow of the Arakan Mountain range which lies between the coast of Rakhine State and central Myanmar. The average annual temperature is 27ºC with temperatures rising as high as over 40ºC in the hot season before the monsoon rains arrive. 3. Water Sources 2 Myanmar has abundant rainfall and an extensive network of rivers. The acute water shortages experienced in parts of the country are a result of the uneven geographical and temporal distribution of rainfall rather than a lack of overall rainfall. The country contains six river basins, of which the Ayeyarwady-Chindwin Basin is by far the largest and drains almost 60% of the country. It is often divided into three sub-basins: the Upper Ayeyarwady, the Lower Ayeyarwady and the Chindwin Basins. The Thanlwin or Salween River Basin in Eastern Myanmar drains almost 20% of the country including the Shan Plateau. The Salween River, one of the the longest free-flowing rivers in the world also forms part of the border between Myanmar and Thailand. The Mekong River Basin drain a small area of territory in the far east of the country. The Mekong River form the border between Myanmar and Laos. The Rakhine Coastal basin drains much of Rakhine state in the west before flowing into the Bay of Bengal. The Tanintharyi River Basin drains much of the southern tail of Myanmar. It flows through Tanintharyi (Tenasserim Division) before draining into the Andaman Sea at Myeik. The Sittaung River Basin drains a small part of central Myanmar, mostly within Bago Division. The Sittaung River flows southwards from the edge of the Shan Plateau to the Gulf of Martaban (part of the Andaman Sea) and is kept separated from the Ayeyarwady River by the short Pegu mountain range. 4. Socio-demographics The last census was conducted in 1983 and population estimates for Myanmar vary. UNICEF, the World Bank and the Economist Intelligence Unit all estimate the population to be around 50 million whilst ASEAN and the Asian Development Bank place the figure close to 60 million. Myanmar is one of the most ethnically and linguistically diverse countries in the world, a consequence of the mass movements of people throughout this area over the previous two millennia There are no fewer than 135 officially recognised ethnic groups 3, divided into what the country s 2008 constitution calls eight major national races. 4 The Burmans or Bamar are the largest ethnic group, comprising about 60% of the population and are predominantly 1 FAO/Aquastat (2010), Myanmar. Accessible at: 2 This section draws heavily on FAO/Aquastat (2010), Myanmar. Accessible at: 3 It should be noted that the reliability of the figure of 135 ethnic races is questionable. It was the figure reached by the 1931 colonial census, which was the last nationwide attempt to collect statistics on the country s ethnic make-up and which contained many methodological flaws. 4 As the Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies Report, Listening to Voices from Inside: Ethnic People Speak (2010), rightly acknowledges, ethnic, ethnic group, and ethnicity are contested and often highly charged terms...[used]...in the absence of better alternatives...ethnicity is subjective, fluid, and plural. Some people may identify with a number of ethnic groups or none at all...currently and historically, these identities are embodied with assumptions and stereotypes. (p.5) 11

12 located in the seven lowland divisions of central Myanmar. The remaining seven groups are Mon, the oldest ethnic group in Myanmar, originally from Central Asia, Shan, Kayin (Karen), Kayah (Karenni), Kachin, Chin and Rakhine (Arakan) Together they total almost 40% of the population and cover almost 60% of Myanmar s territory. They predominantly (although by no means exclusively) live in the upland areas of the country that form a vast arc around lower Myanmar. Approximately one hundred languages are spoken in Myanmar, derived from four major language families: Sino-Tibetan, Austro-Asiatic, Tai Kadai, and Indo- European. 5 Burmese is the country s official language and is the first language of approximately 60% of the population. 5. Administrative Structure According to the 2008 constitution, Myanmar is divided into seven States: Chin, Kachin, Kayah, Kayin, Mon, Rakhine and Shan States; seven Regions (formerly known as Divisions): Ayeyarwaddy, Bago, Magway, Mandalay, Sagaing, Tanintharyi and Yangon Regions; and six self-administered zones: Naga, Palaung, Kokang, Pao, Danu (Namshan and Manton townships) and Wa self-administered zones. These areas are divided into sixty-seven Districts, which are sub-divided into three hundred and thirty townships, which are further sub-divided into approximately 13,759 village tracts (also known as block administrations, especially in urban areas). B. WASH COVERAGE 1. Water Supply Communities source of water varies with the topography of the country. Throughout lowland Myanmar rainfed ponds form the backbone of water supply and an estimated 65-70% of Myanmar s population are reliant upon rainfall collection, either in ponds of rain water collection tanks. Many rural communities have access to a number of ponds within their local vicinity which are used to collect water during the rainy season and then provide a source of easily accessible water throughout the rest of the year. The heavy reliance upon rainfed ponds creates two major weaknesses. Firstly, across large parts of Myanmar (especially the Delta and the Dry Zone) existing ponds are unable to collect sufficient water during the rainy season to cope with demand for water throughout the rest of the year. This creates acute water shortages in the final months (March to May) before the year s monsoon rains arrive. A combination of very high temperatures, late monsoon rains and saline contamination of many existing ponds following Cyclone Nargis in 2008 meant water shortages were especially acute during the 2010 dry season and demonstrated that rural water supplies throughout much of the country were extremely vulnerable. Indeed, the Post-Nargis Periodic Review 3 found that only 35% of households surveyed in Ayeyarwady Division had access to at least three litres of drinking water a day in the rainy season and this fell to only 15% during the dry season. 6 Secondly, water quality in many ponds is extremely poor. Very few ponds are fenced off or have pontoons meaning they are easily contaminated by animals and people that use them. Following Cyclone Nargis many NGOs have attempted to improve water supply across the Delta by constructing new ponds and rehabilitating existing ponds in order to improve the region s storage capacity. Efforts have also been made to improve the quality of pondwater by constructing fencing around ponds, constructing handpumps to 5 For an exhaustive list of these languages, See: The Languages of Myanmar in Lewis, M. Paul (ed.), Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Sixteenth edition. Dallas, Tex.: SIL International. Online version: 6 Tripartite Core Group (2010), Post-Nargis Periodic Review 3, p

13 deliver water from the pond and thus reduce contamination by people collecting water directly from the pond, cultivating grass on pond embankments to reduce soil erosion and by encouraging households to filter, boil or chemically treat pond water before drinking it. The high water table throughout much of lowland Myanmar means that shallow hand dug wells are another common source of water. These are cheap and easy to construct although the preference for open wells, which allow many people to collect water at the same time, means water is easily contaminated. Along the coast and across the Delta the use of wells is also undermined by the fact that much shallow groundwater is highly saline. Tubewells have been constructed by the government and NGOs across the Delta, the Dry Zone and Rakhine State. Tubewells often provide a cleaner and safer source of water than ponds and shallow wells and can reduce reliance upon rainfed ponds. However, they are also expensive to build and maintain (due to the fuel required to operate them) and in coastal areas and across the Delta great care must be taken to reach groundwater that is not saline. Over the past decade dangerously high levels of arsenic have also been discovered in many of Myanmar s shallow aquifers (notable across the Delta Region, Rakhine state and Southern Shan State) again raising concerns about the safety of groundwater collected by tubewells. A number of NGOs are currently trialling solar-powered pumping systems. Solar power us used to pump water from underground to a high tank where the water is stored. A pipe system is then attached to this tank with gravity being used to pump the water throughout the system. Careful monitoring and evaluation will be required to assess whether such systems are cost effective and sustainable. In many areas of upland Myanmar highland water springs and the streams and tributaries they feed are the most common water supply. This creates a different set of challenges. Unlike in lowland Myanmar, where ponds are close to communities, upland water sources are more likely to be some distance away and less easily accessible. NGO interventions are usually focused upon reducing the time and effort required to collect water by using gravity follow systems to bring water much closer to households. These systems can be extremely long in some areas, making them reasonably expensive to construct and hard to maintain, especially since they require resources and skills that are unlikely to be available locally. There has, to date, been far less NGO interventions in urban and peri-urban areas and as a result there is limited knowledge of exactly how the water system functions. Most cities have small piped networks that serve central areas and richer neighbourhoods. Outside of this network access to water varies from one neighbourhood to the other with ponds, handpumps and some tubewells being the major sources of water. Many households purchase water from water vendors who collect water from these sources and deliver it directly to the household. 2. Sanitation There are currently no reliable statistics regarding access to improved sanitation in Myanmar. The WHO/UNICEF Joint Monitoring Programme for water supply and sanitation claim that 86% of the urban population and 79% of the rural population have access to improved sanitation and also claim that there only 1% of the rural population practice open defecation (with the practice non-existent in urban areas). 7 These statistics, however, appear to be a 7 WHO/Unicef Joint Monitoring Programme (2010), Progress on Sanitation and Drinking Water, 2010 Update 13

14 gross understatement of the sanitation challenges facing the country and most NGOs working in Myanmar emphasize that sanitation coverage is much lower. Although unable to provide a clear national overview of sanitation coverage, detailed Knowledge, Attitude and Practice (KAP) reports compiled by some NGOs when designing interventions provide a number of useful insights. Firstly, the prevalence of open defecation varies hugely across the country. Whilst there is extensive latrine coverage across the Delta and in other areas of the country, open defecation is an almost universal practice in Northern Rakhine State where latrine coverage is estimated to be less than 5%. Secondly, although many households have latrines few are actually sanitary. Many are not fly-proof, are close to water sources, are vulnerable to flooding during the rainy season and waste if often not properly washed down into the pit below. Thirdly, latrines coverage and latrine usage are not necessarily the same thing. Latrines are generally unpopular due to their smell and lack of comfort. The smell often causes households to build them as far away as the main house as possible discouraging their use during bad weather and at night. Fourthly, it is extremely difficult to achieve universal latrine usage within communities. This may be because households that are in extreme poverty or are female-headed may struggle to afford the materials or have the manpower required to build a latrine, or because the elderly or children are reluctant to use them, or because some individuals prefer to defecate in the open. Fifthly, sanitation coverage, rarely extends beyond the household meaning that there are very limited sanitation facilities during the day for those who farm land some distance away from the house. Finally, building sanitary latrines that are resilient is dependent upon a number of local factors, such as the soil type (light, sandy soils being the most difficult in which to dig latrine pits), the availability of materials to build an air-tight pit that will prevent waste from polluting groundwater, and the risk of flooding during the rainy season. Community-led total sanitation is currently being trialled in Myanmar. Training of trainers took place in July and CLTS is currently being piloted in a small number of villages across Myanmar. CLTS s focus on mobilising communities to abandon open defecation, rather than by employing a top-down approach to latrine construction through the offering of subsidies, may be particularly suitable for Myanmar where the sustainability of basic services is often heavily reliant upon communities being able to manage them with minimal external assistance. The fact that CLTS does not require any costly materials may also help to ensure levels of sanitation can be improved even in the poorest communities. The focus on facilitating behaviour change (rather than just providing more latrines) will also be extremely valuable in light of the fact that many NGOs have acknowledged that unhygienic behaviour is only partly attributable to a lack of knowledge about hygiene and is often the result of deeplyingrained practices that are hard to change (see Chapter 2). Addressing this requires more than simply educating communities about hygiene; it requires careful and sustained facilitation to ensure the adoption of sanitary practices. However, there have also been concerns raised with regards to the applicability of CLTS in Myanmar. Many NGO staff have warned that the way in which CLTS attempts to trigger behaviour change by provoking a sense of shame and disgust at open defecation is unlikely to fit easily with Burmese culture. Others have warned that the refusal to allow any external material inputs and the expectation that latrines should be built using materials sourced from within the community may cause numerous problems. Firstly, it may only serve to mobilise households of a particular income level, since richer households may wish to purchase higher quality materials whilst the poorest families, even if they wish to abandon open defecation, may lack the finances and/or manpower to build their own latrine. Secondly, the focus on 14

15 achieving total abandonment of open defecation may lead to a focus on the quantity of latrines constructed rather than ensuring that latrines are actually sanitary. Finally, there is also the concern that the need for a community to achieve total latrine usage before being awarded open defecation free status may entail the risk of existing authoritarian power structures being used to coerce change. CLTS will therefore need to be trialled carefully and rigorously monitored and evaluated in order to ensure that its potential benefits are maximised and the risks minimized. 3. Hygiene and behaviour change Improving levels of hygiene in Myanmar remains a major challenge. The reasons for this are explained in detail in Section A5 of Chapter 2, which explains the reasons why unhygienic practices are so common and why facilitating behaviour change is so important to ensuring that improved access to safe water and sanitation leads to lasting benefits. For the sake of brevity, the detailed analysis provided in Section A5 will not be repeated here. C. THE WASH SECTOR 1. History and Development of the WASH sector Prior to 1980 there was very little external engagement or NGO presence in the WASH sector in Myanmar. This began to change during the International Decade for Clean Drinking Water ( ) during which a partnership developed between the Myanmar government and external agencies, notably UNICEF (which had been working in Myanmar in various other capacities since 1950) and the Asian Development Bank. During the 1990s and early twenty-first century more UN agencies became involved in providing water and sanitation services and a growing INGO presence also emerged in the sector. World Vision, Save the Children, Malteser and CESVI have all been present in Myanmar for ten years or more and their work has included many small-scale water and sanitation projects. UN agencies and INGOs initially focused very heavily on hardware provision to improve access to water, with far less emphasis upon sanitation, hygiene or community mobilisation. The Water and Sanitation Thematic Group (WTG) was established in the late nineties to coordinate and improve the work of various UN agencies. Since 2001 bilateral agencies and INGOs have joined the group, which also became a platform to discuss technical challenges within the sector. Since 2005 there has been a growing interest in the sector regarding the importance of hygiene promotion and behaviour change facilitation, reflected by the fact that in 2007 UNICEF changed the name of the sector from Water, Environment and Sanitation (WES) to Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH). Although levels of government investment in the sector remain low, the government has sought to improve levels of hygiene through the Department of Health s long-running Four Cleans Initiative which aims to increase awareness about the importance of clean food, clean water, clean hands and clean toilets. The emergency response to Cyclone Nargis, which struck the country in 2008, had a profound impact on the development of the WASH sector. The Cyclone encouraged many organisations to consider working in the country and this led to a realisation that the challenges to working effectively in Myanmar, although significant, were by no means insurmountable. As a result there was a rapid growth in the INGO presence in the country with many INGOs focusing heavily on improving water and sanitation provision as part of 15

16 their emergency response and the recovery phase that followed. Nargis also led to an equally rapid emergence of local NGOs, many of whom also heavily prioritised water and sanitation. The creation of the Tripartite Core Group (TCG), established by the UN, ASEAN and the Myanmar Government to manage the response to the disaster through the Post-Nargis Recovery and Preparedness Plan (PONREPP), also reflected the growing potential for better coordination between the government and external agencies. The WASH Cluster, which was used to co-ordinate the sector during the Nargis emergency response has now merged with Water and Sanitation Thematic Group to form the WASH Thematic Group. This acts as a forum for UN agencies, local NGOs and INGOs to share information about how to develop WASH services across the country and has recently established sub-groups on Gender and Behaviour Change. In many ways Cyclone Nargis acted as an urgent wake-up call, especially to the UN agencies which had been working in Myanmar for decades, since it placed a strong spotlight on Myanmar s acute poverty and revealed just how limited the progress of rural development has been over the past thirty years. The WASH sector is now at something of a crossroads. There is a renewed desire amongst UN agencies and many NGOs to utilise the momentum that has been gained in the response to Cyclone Nargis to launch a far more committed effort to achieve sustainable rural development, not just in the Delta region but right across the country. There is a belief that the international community can play a major role in supporting the development of basic services in Myanmar rather than merely reacting to humanitarian emergencies. There is also an awareness that much of the humanitarian work conducted in the aftermath of the cyclone will not lead to lasting improvements in water and sanitation provision unless communities continue to receive support to develop basic services. Without this continued support communities will not be able to develop a greater resilience against the impact of future natural disasters. However, the desire to re-orientate the sector away from providing humanitarian aid to creating the foundations for sustainable development has been undermined by a number of factors. Firstly, the need to respond to the humanitarian crises caused by the severe drought across much of the Dry Zone in 2010, Cyclone Giri in October 2010 and the Tachilek earthquake in March 2011 has also meant that much of the sector s funding has continued to be spent on humanitarian rather than development work. Secondly, and more importantly, is the need to ensure that future interventions are better designed to ensure that services are able to have a lasting impact. Understandably, the focus of the initial humanitarian response to Nargis was to save lives and to construct emergency coping mechanisms; it was not to devise services that would be sustainable in the long term. However, the challenges that NGOs face when working in Myanmar has perpetuated a short-term emergency response approach to service delivery long after the Cyclone, with inadequate consideration given the questionable sustainability of such approaches. There is no doubt that the need and demand for improved WASH services in Myanmar is huge and that NGOs have the potential to make a hugely positive difference. However, at the same time as there are calls for greater funding to be made available, there must also be an honest appraisal of the challenges facing the sector and weaknesses within current approaches to WASH service provision so that future funding will have a more sustained impact. 16

17 2. WASH Policy and Institutional Environment The government has a National Health Policy (1993) and a National Environment Policy (1994) but neither of these provide a specific water and sanitation policy nor do they set standards for water quality. Although there are some limited statutory laws regarding urban water supply there is no legislative framework for rural water supply. There is no single institutional home for WASH and responsibilities for WASH provision are divided between numerous ministries including: Agriculture and Industry, Health, Education, Forestry, Development Affairs and the Yangon, Mandalay and Naypyidaw City Development Council. There is currently no clear policy framework or sector guidelines. 3. International NGOs working in the sector The emergency response to Cyclone Nargis led to a rapid growth in the number of international NGOs working in WASH in Myanmar. The work of most INGOs is heavily concentrated in the Delta region and across lowland Myanmar. However, the emergency response to cyclone Giri in October 2010 saw many INGOs undertake projects in Northern Rakhine State for the first time and the acute water shortages experienced across the Dry Zone in 2010 has encouraged many INGOs to consider expanding their work into this area of the country. However, limited funding, the uncertain operating environment in Myanmar and ongoing ethical concerns in the west regarding the correct role that INGOs should play in the country s development continue to limit the expansion of INGO involvement in the WASH sector. There is notably almost no INGO engagement in WASH in urban or peri-urban areas. Government authorisation to work in Myanmar To work in Myanmar, all INGOs are required to sign a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the relevant central government ministry. A livelihoods or food security project, for example, would usually require an MOU to be signed with the Ministry of Agriculture and Irrigation, a project to tackle HIV/AIDS, malaria or TB would require an MOU with the Ministry of Health and an educational project with the Ministry of Education. In the aftermath of Cyclone Nargis, the MOU application process was temporarily streamlined with all applications from INGOs wishing to work in the Delta region being administered through the Ministry of Social Welfare, Relief and Recovery. It is unclear whether the changes to the political structure of the country following the 2010 general election will have any bearing on the MOU process, although it seems likely that MOUs will continue to be administered by whichever central ministry is most relevant to the project and the process will not be decentralised. The MOU is a standard form which outlines the responsibilities of the INGO and the government, stipulates which townships and village tracts an INGO is able to work within, and requires the INGO to state the financial commitment it will make to projects in these areas. The government decides which townships are covered by the MOU. INGOs are usually only able to apply for funding from donors once they have gained the necessary MOU to work in the area and sector for which funding is available. The MOU will then be inspected by the township authorities to ensure that all work remains within the boundaries set by the MOU and INGOs are expected to provide regular monthly reports to these authorities regarding the work they are doing and the villages they plan to work in the following month. 17

18 The application process for MOUs is uncertain, lacks transparency and can be extremely slow. This is especially true for INGOs which have not worked in the country previously and which are carefully scrutinised by the government. The process tends to be slightly smoother and quicker for those INGOs which have worked in the country for a number of years and have managed to build a degree of trust with the government. It is also much harder to sign an MOU with the government to work in sensitive areas of the country, especially in the country s ethnic states where the government s sovereignty remains contested. MOUs usually last for two to three years, after which they have to be renewed. Renewal is by no means a certainty and can once again be an infuriatingly slow process. Many INGOs which have worked across the Delta region following Cyclone Nargis are currently waiting to see if their MOU applications to continue working in this region or to begin work in the Dry Zone are approved. Almost all INGOs consulted for this Report stated that direct government interference in their work was minimal and certainly no more invasive than in many other countries in which they work. With careful management, it is possible to attain the same standards of accountability and transparency as expected wherever they work. The biggest challenge to working effectively in Myanmar lies in the sheer uncertainty and lack of transparency surrounding their relationship with the government, which in turn makes it very difficult for them to develop clear and coherent plans for the long term development of their work in Myanmar. This uncertainty is witnessed not only during the MOU application process outlined above but also surrounds visa applications, internal travel, and financial matters. Visas In a similar way to the application process for MOUs, visa applications tend to be easier for those working at INGOs that are well established in Myanmar and those who have worked in the country for a reasonable period of time. New staff are often only able to apply for three month visas, which must be renewed outside of the country and which only allow limited travel within the country. Staff who have worked in Myanmar for a long time are often able to apply for annual multi-entry visas. However, the process for renewing visas remains uncertain and untransparent. Travel authorisation Foreigners require special travel authorisation to access all parts of the country beyond the major cities and tourist sites. Applications to travel must be applied for centrally, often a week or more in advance and, once issued, authorisation documents are carefully checked by township officials. Even when foreign staff do gain travel authorisation, they are prevented from staying overnight in rural areas where they are working. It is also common for a government liaison official from the township office to accompany foreign staff when they are working with communities. Gaining authorisation to travel in areas that are politically sensitive can be extremely difficult. In sensitive areas of the country s ethnic states, there is effectively a double or even triple authorisation process in which travel authorisation must be granted first by the central government, then by the state government and finally by the Immigration Department and relevant government ministry at township level (for WASH this is often the Township Medial Officer within the township s Health Department.) This multilayered authorisation process often creates delay and confusion as the ultimate decision as to whether allow access is passed back and forth between the different levels of authority. Relationship with the government 18

19 Most INGOs endeavour to reduce the uncertainty surrounding their work by attempting to building good relations with authorities at the township level by adhering to the legal and administrative requirements set by the government, by clearly demonstrating how their work is benefitting the communities they are working with and by trying to find individuals within the township department to voice their concerns and demands with the higher authorities. This approach tends to work more effectively in non-politically sensitive areas of the country and where an organisation has built a strong reputation; it is far less effective in many of the ethnic states where most decisions are made centrally. 4. The growth of local NGOs working in the sector The rapid growth in the number of local NGOs in Myanmar is one of the most important but least reported developments in the sector over the past three years. 8 A significant number of Myanmar s LNGOs were established in the aftermath of cyclone Nargis and many now specialise in WASH provision having initially focused on providing water and sanitation in the initial months following the disaster. There is a strong desire within many LNGOs to utilise the momentum gained from their experiences following Nargis to start to play a much larger role in the development of WASH services throughout the rest of the country. Most LNGOs currently work in partnership with INGOs and few have been awarded significant funding directly from donors. LNGO strengths The emergence of a growing body of LNGOs in the sector offers many important opportunities. LNGOs tend to have very good knowledge about the social, economic and cultural environment into which services are to be implemented. They are able to forge closer links with communities than INGOs and often have a clear and powerful commitment to mobilising and developing the capacity and resilience of the communities they work with. They also have greater government acceptance and trust than INGOs and subsequently are able to travel throughout the country with far fewer restrictions. This can make them especially well-placed to respond quickly to emergencies, as was the case following Cyclone Giri in Northern Rakhine State, where a number of LNGOs reached the most affected areas within 36 hours. They also have far fewer overhead costs and the fact that their decisionmaking is not reliant upon gaining permission from an overseas central head office allows them a far greater degree of flexibility and pragmatism. In many ways they offer an extremely viable potential exit strategy for INGOs currently working in Myanmar since they could eventually provide the kind of ongoing support (financial, capacity building etc) to CBOs that is often critical to the sustainability of a service. Current weaknesses However, if these opportunities are to be realised there must first be a proper assessment of LNGOs current weaknesses, the major challenges they face and how these challenges can be properly addressed. Currently, many LNGOs have very limited capacity in terms of project cycle management, organisational development, accounting, proposal writing, budgeting, logistics and conducting baseline surveys, data collection and monitoring and evaluation. Many are the brainchild of dynamic and inspirational figures but are lacking the internal structure and middle management required to work effectively and consequently fail the rigid standards of transparency and accountability expected by donors. 8 It should be noted that a number of local NGOs did exist before