COMMUNITY LED TOTAL SANITATION

CTLS Verification and certifying ODF STATUS

Verifying ODF status is a key activity. Verification entails inspection to assess whether a community is ODF. Certification is the confirmation of the status and its official recognition. Especially where there are rewards for ODF status, communities and officials may have incentives to seek certification before ODF status has been fully achieved. Cases are known of deception and corruption where community rewards follow certification. To guard against this, and to assure sustained ODF standards, many different approaches have been used.

Inspections can be and have been carried out by combinations of:

1. People from neighbouring communities (especially when there is completion) 2. Natural leaders and others from ODF communities. 3. A government committee. 4. Staff of government departments 5. Staff of NGOs 6. Teachers 7. Members of the general public. For example, many may be invited to come from neighbouring villages. 8. Combinations of these.

Some useful principles and practices;

1. Revolving membership of verification and certification committee (to reduce dangers of corruption where there are rewards)

2. Natural leaders from ODF villages as members of inspection teams

3. Women members especially to investigate women’s sanitary arrangements

4. More than one checks up visit.

5. A surprise visit.

6. A visit before dawn.

7. All members of the committee to sign any verification.

8. No official certification, unless it has been sustained for 6 months.

9. When there has been thorough and stringent verification, a board can be put at the entrance to a village, declaring it to be ODF.

10. Where a whole administrative area is to be verified, many members of organisations and of the public can be informed and invited to take part, as with sub-districts in North West Bangladesh (where in one case the “inspectors” numbered some 500)

A test of the standard of declarations and certifications may be the frequency with which they are withheld or withdrawn. Natural leaders are the inspectors most likely to be perceptive and rigorous. Where they took part in Cambodia, 7 out of 11 communities were failed.

CLTS Participatory monitoring and indicators

The map made on the ground when redrawn on paper can show households who have latrines and those who do not. Displayed publicly in a meeting place where all can see it, it can serve as a reminder of commitment to take action. As households gain access to a latrine (whether their own or shared) and stop open defecation, the maps can be updated regularly by natural leaders. Some have used different colours for different weeks of completion, and for shared latrines. The map thus serves as a monitoring tool and creates competition among the community members to build their latrine. The map should remain vibrant until all households are marked as using a latrine and the whole village has declared itself ODF.

Ask communities and natural leaders what other indicators they with to use to monitor progress. Encourage them to use these and make them public in the community. Encourage people to develop their own indicators for monitoring change.

Monitoring of process and progress

Indicators of process and progress to watch for are:

1. Number and range of natural leaders who emerge, from women, men, youth and others. 2. Households constructing latrines or toilets jointly. 3. Sharing latrines or toilets between neighbours or relatives or traditional or other groupings. 4. Formation of new groups. 5. Better off people coming forward to help those who are weaker and poorer. 6. Revival of traditional midwives, and others becoming active. 7. Volunteers, traditional midwives, and others becoming active. 8. New slogans, songs, and poems. 9. Increased sales of sanitary hardware in markets. 10. The emergence of different of latrines and toilets. 11. Use of non-conventional materials for latrines and toilets. 12. The emergence of community sanctions against OD. 13. Communities providing collective help to those with difficulties. 14. Sanitary hardware given as gifts. (e.g. to newly married couples) 15. Reduction in diarrhoeas and in sales of medicines for diarrhoeas. 16. Decreasing health expenditure and income of village quacks. 17. Fewer flies.

Be alert after triggering CLTS

Where CLTS sparks off urgent collective action OD practices may reduce and stop very fast. 100 per cent ODF status may be achieved within a few days, weeks or months depending on conditions and the size of the community. Follow-up is important, in order to ensure that CLTS is sustained and improvements in latrines and practices are made over the long term.

Be alert for positive developments;

1. Those with toilets wishing to convince others. 2. People who jump into action. 3. Better of people who are willing to help those who are worse off. 4. Formal or informal leaders (for example religious leaders) calling meetings. 5. People with unused hardware starting to install it. 6. Natural leaders emerging.

Be sensitive in encouraging and supporting them. Do not take over from them. Do not interfere in anyway that might undermine their ownership and energy. Remember – it is their process, not yours.

Be alert for negative developments:

1. Leaders earlier involved in hardware subsidy programmes opposing self-help. 2. Political leaders and rumour-mongers saying that subsidy might be forthcoming. 3. Other organizations with subsidy programmes intervening and subverting CTLS. 4. Doubts raised by outsiders on technical or other grounds. 5. Frontline staff feeling undermined and threatened.

To counteract these

1. Be proactive in encouraging natural leaders to assert themselves. 2. Ask people whether subsidies have worked in the past. 3. Point out that CLTS is a process and technical and other problems can usually be tackled as they arise, for example through moving up the sanitation ladder. 4. Investigate the validity of any technical or other doubts that have been raised. 5. Explain to frontline staff the benefits of CLTS and bring them into the process.

Convene meetings with other CLTS- triggered communities to share experiences, plans and actions.

When several communities have been triggered at the same time (as often with facilitator training), convene a meeting soon after. Ask natural leaders to report action on the triggering process, community decisions, actions already taken their plans of action, and dates for declaration of ODF. The more enthusiastic can encourage the scattered sparks, and also damp matchboxes if they are there.

Video documentation of commitments made by individuals in the early stages can be very effective in persuading others later. Videoing the construction details of low cost toilets can help others to see what they could do.