Children educates community on sanitation - Governance in India

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My organization, the Natco Trust has been working in the slums of Hyderabad, and in the districts ofMahboobnagar, Medak, Nizamabad.The approach to involve children is really effective in creating awareness in the rural and urban schoolsabout safe drinking water and sanitation. Approaches that have built upon Teacher to Child, Child toChild, Child to parent paths have become a strong force for the Total Sanitation Campaign inMahboobnagar district of Andhra Pradesh and in slums of Hyderabad.We have introduced joyful and playful methods for children by means of puppetry, and trained themabout good and bad habits using miming and one act plays etc. The impact was really very high,leading to total sanitation in the villages.Lima Rosalind, WWF-India, New DelhiHi friends, this is in response to D.K. Mohanty's mail.<strong>Children</strong>'s involvement in water testing needs a hands-on approach. However there are a few elementsthat we need to keep in mind, paramount among which is the safety aspects to prevent watercontamination. Simple things like wearing gloves while handling the samples will go a long way.Second, involving schools from the vicinity of a water body in water testing can be a sustainableactivity, as the periodicity of testing can then be worked out without worrying about logistics. There areinnumerable case studies on using the water testing kits by students as done in the Ganga Action Plan,the Yamuna Action Plan and even the Thames river clean up.The period of monitoring can be fixed depending on the objectives for the water testing. This datashould be made available to the village and the district authorities to ascertain the quality of the waterwhich may be used for human and animal consumption.<strong>Children</strong> should be made the authors of such an exercise and the data collected should be put online bychildren themselves.<strong>Children</strong> are excellent agents of change. Let us teach them and learn from them and nurture theirtalents through such participative exercises.Arunabha Majumder, All India Institute of Hygiene and Public Health, KolkataIn school, students must learn the following with respect to water and environmental sanitation :• What is safe water• Water- sanitation- health linkages• Illness and its consequences• Ideas about water quality• Sources of water• Water conservation• Need for protection of water• Ideas about recycling of water• Rain water harvesting• Simple methods of water treatment• Why to stop open defecation• Importance of use of toilets• What is sanitary latrine
• Ideas about low cost latrine• Maintaining safe distance between toilet pit and water source• Importance of hand-washing• Importance of regular nail-cutting, mouth-washing, bathing• Importance of personal hygiene• Domestic and environmental cleanliness• Solid waste segregation (organic & inorganic) at source• Use of containers for storing waste• House to house collection of Solid Waste• Composting• Vermi-composting• Importance of good drainage• Hygiene in food handling, cooking, eating, storage, etc.• Use of smokeless chulhaThe above components can be taught in stages to generate awareness. Students may also be motivatedto make others aware. The teachers must be oriented on these issues through refreshers trainingprogram. IEC materials also need to be developed. Students may be involved for development of IECmaterials also.R. Srikanth, WaterAid, New DelhiIn my view, if students learn hygiene and sanitation as part of their curriculum, they will end up justpassing exams. In fact, groups of students should be encouraged to do ''live projects '' as practicallessons in each of the items outlined by Majumder. In case students are doing testing using portablekits, they could cover one or two parameters in water quality from class four till they reach secondaryschool like the PH and TDS; Fluoride on a quarterly/ yearly basis from water bodies like lakes andrivers; handpumps, etc.By doing so, they will be having considerable data on a number of phenomenon such as Eutrophication[water pollution caused by excessive plant nutrients], acidity, sources of pollution, etc. based on thechanges in ph and other values. This data collected over 5 years is so useful in predicting the trends inwater quality and is useful in understanding the impact of environment on water quality.In a vast country like India, we seldom have data on water quality of all existing water body in ruralareas. Various programmes of United Nations Environment Programme, like Global EnvironmentMonitoring System [GEMS Water http://www.gemswater.org ] and Monitoring of Indian National AquaticResources (MINARS) are focused on inland rivers and lakes located in urban areas. By involving childrenconstructively, we can also create a data base on rural water quality. We need to experiment furtherwith this idea.Mrinalinee Vanarase, IORA for Environmental Solutions, Pune (response 2)It is a great pleasure reading various efforts and success stories of involving children in constructivework.Further to my response to the role of children in creating awareness on water and sanitation, I givebelow a checklist that students can use for recording observations for eco-restoration of streams.http://www.solutionexchange-un.net.in/environment/cr/res19040701.doc (Size: 42 KB)
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