A new WSP publication, Policy and Sector Reform to Accelerate Access to Improved Rural Sanitation, by Fred Rosensweig, Eddy Perez, and Andy Robinson, finds that accelerating rates of increase for improved sanitation requires systemic sector and policy reform . Baseline and endline assessments of the enabling environment for rural sanitation programs in India, Indonesia, and Tanzania in 2007 and 2010, respectively, sought to take a deep look at the programmatic and institutional conditions needed to scale up, sustain large scale rural sanitation programs. India, Indonesia, and Tanzania made the most significant progress in four enabling environment component areas: •?program methodology •?implementation capacity •?availability of sanitation products and services •?monitoring and evaluation. Although state-of-the-art knowledge on how to strengthen the enabling environment for rural sanitation is still a work in progress, this assessment findings strongly suggests that the countries with the strongest enabling environment made the most progress. For example, the state government in Himachal Pradesh, India, which had the strongest enabling environment ratings achieved almost universal access. This assessment also concluded that an explicit focus on the rural sanitation sub-sector focuses attention on the specific issues required to strengthen the enabling environment and the findings support the hypothesis that local government can serve as the centerpiece of an at-scale rural sanitation program. Other enabling environment component areas, such as policy, strategy, and direction; institutional arrangements; financing and incentives; and cost-effective implementation proved more difficult to influence during the three-year interval between baseline and endline. In Tanzania, for example, insufficient financing was allocated to meet rural sanitation Millennium Development Goal targets; while in Indonesia inadequate credit options were made available for sanitation entrepreneurs—both key constraints to progress. The experience also indicates that although all components of the enabling environment are important, not all are equally amenable to external intervention and therefore can take more time to address. External agencies have less influence, for example, in strengthening political will than in strengthening implementation capacity. As this Working Paper discusses, accelerating rates of increase for improved sanitation access requires systemic sector and policy reform. The baseline and endline assessments of the enabling environment for rural sanitation programs in India, Indonesia, and Tanzania in 2007 and 2010, respectively, sought to learn more about the effect of these elements on access to improved sanitation. These assessments examined the programmatic and institutional conditions needed to scale up and sustain large-scale rural sanitation programs.

Bibliographic information

Rosensweig, F., Perez, E., Robinson, A. (2012). Policy and sector reform to accelerate access to improved rural sanitation Water and sanitation program: Working paper World Bank, Water and Sanitation Program (WSP)

Filter / Tags

RuralPoliticians and local decision makersEnglish

Related Countries

IndiaIndonesiaTanzania United Republic of

Downloads