Pan in the Van: an innovative women-centric approach for inclusive water, sanitation, and hygiene services

Abstract

The prevailing approaches of awareness generation and capacity building for improving water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) services are monotonous and lack continuity. They often inadequately address the strategic needs of women, i.e., key roles in planning, management, and monitoring process focussing on limited aspects such as triggering, hand washing, toilet construction, etc., and do not offer a complete solution for WASH covering all key components such as menstrual hygiene, location, supply, and governance in a coordinated manner. Pan in Van is an innovative on-site women-centric capacity building approach for inclusive WASH. The aim of this particular campaign approach is to accelerate the elimination of open defecation by addressing the gaps prevailing in capacity building and behavior change communication efforts. The approach is based on on-site principles with a format for women-centric processes. It creates space for women’s participation, thereby empowering them to take leadership roles. A four-step approach for a complete package for achieving and sustaining cost-effective sanitation is offered.