Learning
Sustaining rural water supply using the principles of collective Impact
Collective impact is the commitment of a group of actors from different sectors to a common agenda for solving a complex social problem. Samantha King describes in a blog post how IRC and its partners in Ghana are applying many of the principles of collective impact in the process and actions to address the water […]
The WASH Sector School of ‘Hard Knocks’ – learning from experience for dealing with the future
By Deirdre Casella and Carmen da Silva Wells The capacity to continuously learn and adapt is critical for dealing with complex challenges and future uncertainties. In this first blog in a series about ‘a learning and adaptive sector’, we discuss why learning is central to achieving water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) services for life. If our […]
Cautiously optimistic
What will it take to create WASH sectors that work? By Patrick Moriarty, Harold Lockwood, and Sarah Carriger Over the past few months in a series of posts we’ve been advocating for a change in the goal of the WASH sector – from increasing coverage to delivering a service over the long haul; from simply building […]
Long, expensive & messy: the realities of sector change
By Patrick Moriarty, Harold Lockwood, Vida Duti and Sarah Carriger In the last post in this series we described our approach to changing the whole system to deliver water services that people can count on: not just for a few years, but for life. We laid out the main phases in this change: initiation, learning […]
Everyone together for everyone forever: changing the whole system in practice
by Patrick Moriarty and Harold Lockwood In the first post in this series, we explained why we believe that a paradigm shift is needed in the WASH sector: moving beyond the construction of physical hardware to the universal provision of safe drinking water (and sanitation) services worthy of the name. Because of the number of […]
Changing the whole system to provide water, sanitation and hygiene services that last
By Patrick Moriarty and Harold Lockwood – For the last six years or so, primarily through our WASHCost and Triple-S initiatives, IRC has engaged deeply with the challenges of what it takes to provide sustainable water, sanitation and hygiene services. We think that we’ve identified many parts of the puzzle (and so have many others […]
A visit to Gammarth, Tunisia, or what I learnt at the African Development Bank’s retreat for rural water and sanitation
By Harold Lockwood Last week in Gammarth, Tunis the African Development Bank called a meeting, attended by about 160 sector experts and other government officials, to launch a new coordination mechanism for its flagship Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Initiative, or RWSSI. It was an interesting couple of days and through the various presentations, discussions, […]
