Government of Sindh has initiated a multi-sector and multi-year Programme called “Accelerated Action Plan (AAP)” for Reduction of Stunting and Malnutrition in Sindh. Local Government Department is assigned to play its role for improvement of WASH facilities in the targeted rural communities. Initially this is a five years program for ten rural districts of Sindh. Currently the program has been started in two districts Sukkur and Mirpurkhas.

The objective under WASH component in AAP is to reduce open defecation practices and improve hygiene promotion through hand washing in rural areas of Sindh. This program will ensure open defecation free rural communities including provision of sanitation services and promotion of hygiene practices. For community participation and ownership Community Let Total Sanitation approach will be followed. In this approach, through a process of participatory facilitation, community members analyze their own sanitation status, including the extent of open defecation and the spread of fecal-oral contamination that adversely affects each one of them. Once people are convinced about the need of sanitation, communities construct latrines at their own at the household level, according to their own capacity, and more importantly use it regularly with strong sense of ownership. This all needs a behavior change campaign for not only the use of sanitary toilets but also for hand washing with soap at critical times. The program is mainly to create awareness among communities through social mobilization and behavior change communication by hiring services of NGOs.
The selected NGO will be having a target to make 600 selected villages as 100% Open Defecation Free (ODF) Villages in its assigned district. The selection of villages in the district will be finalized by District Coordination Committee with a view that the selected 600 villages cater approximately 70% of district’s rural population. The key performance indicators are “Village Profiling, Number of Villages made, declared, verified and Certified ODF, Improvement in hand washing practices and reduction of diarrheal cases in ODF certified villages”.
Ten target districts in the first phase include Mirpurkhas, Sukkur, N’ Feroze (excl. Mehrabpur and Moro), Khairpur (exc. Kotdigi, Kingri and Gambat), Shaheed Benazirabad, Hyderabad, Ghotki, Jamshoro, Matiari & Tando Allahyar.