DEVELOPING REGULATORY AND RISK MANAGEMENT APPROACHES TO STRENGTHEN CITYWIDE INCLUSIVE SANITATION WITH INTEGRITY
PROGRAMME BASICS
Dates
2023-Current
Location(s)
Global programme, Research in Bangladesh, Rwanda, Tanzania, and Zambia.
Partners
ESAWAS and ITN-BUET With support from Aguaconsult and Blue Chain Consulting
Make citywide inclusive sanitation a reality with integrity
Find out more, support the programme, collaborate on research.
Contact the programme coordinator:
WHAT IT'S ABOUT
Sanitation is dignity, yet it lacks the attention and investment it deserves. The issues are not just technical. Citywide Inclusive Sanitation (CWIS) provides a framework to address gaps by emphasising accountability and enabling environments for sanitation as a right. Unlike usual urban sanitation approaches, it focuses not only on piped sewerage systems but different systems (sewered or not) and suppliers (public, householde, private and informal vendors) that can ensure service throughout all parts of a city.
However, corruption and integrity failures hinder the expansion of sanitation services to all. They can also impact CWIS implementation. These failures are often misunderstood or ignored yet they are undermining the work of sanitation practitioners and regulators. They weaken service delivery, hamper the upgrading of infrastructure, erode public and household health, and deepen the oppression of women.
There are many ways to act for integrity and address these issues. Our work supports these efforts by identifying risks and offering targeted solutions. Regulators, service providers, and funders can seize these opportunities to ensure equitable sanitation for all while building trust and resilience across the value chain.
Opportunities for regulators
Get free online training for your team on the linkages between regulation, CWIS, and integrity
ITN-BUET and ESAWAS are offering free training to regulators and sanitation practitioners to:
Understand the basic concepts of integrity, regulation, and CWIS
Analyse how integrity helps to achieve better regulation in CWIS programmes
Equip sanitation professionals to better understand and respond to integrity risks along the sanitation value chain
Examine case studies from different parts of the world about the power of transparency, accountability, participation, and anti-corruption.
The 2024 session of the course is full. Contact us to join the training waiting list for 2025.
Pilot indicators to monitor integrity of urban sanitation service providers
Get involved for the Global Call to Action on Strenghtening Water and Sanitation Regulatory Systems
INTEGRITY FOR INCLUSIVE SANITATION: WHAT WE KNOW SO FAR
There are significant integrity risks across the sanitation value chain. Sanitation is specifically vulnerable given:
uneven and less intensive regulation,
the involvement of more small or informal providers, and
the often inadequate working conditions for sanitation workers.
Better sanitation services will depend on effectively addressing these risks. Five critical improvements are needed:
Clear mandates of sanitation practitioners and autonomy of regulators
Transparent criteria and decision-making processes for subsidies, tariffs, licencing, budget allocation, financing
Proactive integrity risk assessments to target specific measures
Better engagement with users
Multi-stakeholder oversight of expenditure and service levels, buffered by better data
Regulators play a crucial role and can benefit from targeting integrity specifically. A proactive integrity approach requires cooperation and data sharing and combines:
broad regulatory mechanisms that promote inclusion (service standards for different sanitation service models, pro-poor guidelines etc.), and
specific regulatory mechanisms that address specific operational risks (financial management guidelines, criteria for technology selection, monitoring, saftey and health regulations etc.)
Read the research:
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Understanding integrity risks across the sanitation value chain and first paths for action | Focus on regulation: Findings from Bangladesh, Rwanda, Tanzania, and Zambia | Country reports |
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