Raphael Ahenu receiving his award from Terry Waite

A Ghanaian journalist and human rights campaigner has won a British award for his water and sanitation campaign. Raphael Ahenu received a 2009 SMK Campaigner Award in the international category on 17 September 2009.

Mr. Ahenu is campaigning for clean water and sanitation facilities to be provided to 100 communities, schools and hospitals in the Brong-Ahafo and Ashanti regions of Ghana by 2015. Through radio talk shows and other publicity methods he mobilises rural communities to demand their rights to such facilities. Mr. Ahenu plans to advocate at the local level and lobby central government so that water and sanitation facilities are provided to rural communities in both these regions.

The Sheila McKechnie Foundation (SMK) is a charity set up in 2005 to connect, inform and support campaigners. The winners of the annual SMK awards receive support, advise and training to further develop their campaigns.

Mr. Ahenu is CEO of African Media Aid (AFRIMA) based in Sunyani. He offcially launched his “Access to Clean Water and Sanitation” campaign on 25 September 2009 at Odumase in the Sunyani West District of the Brong-Ahafo Region. Ay the launch, he announced that from next year AFRIMA and Global Media Foundation (GLOMEF) would be presenting Sanitation and Hygiene Awards to recognise outstanding achievements in this area by organisations, individuals and communities in Ghana.

See a short interview with Raphael, speaking just after he received his award from humanitarian and former envoy for the Church of England Terry Waite.

Source: SMK, 17 Sep 2009 ; Michael Boateng, The Chronicle / allAfrica.com, 25 Sep 2009

Three UN agencies, UNESCO, FAO and UN-HABITAT, have been elected on the new Board of Governors of the World Water Council (WWC), organisers of the World Water Forum (WWF). Activists see the election as a reaction to their own lobby to get the United Nations to organise the next World Water Forum instead of the WWC. The activists say that 26 countries’ governments had endorsed their call for a UN-led forum after the 5th WWF in Istanbul in March 2009.

After it became known that the WWC was lobbying to get the UN on board, activist groups started a counter-lobbying offensive with a petition directed at the UN’s Secretary General to prevent UN agencies from joining. The petition, which attracted nearly 700 signatories, was an initiative of the Blue Planet Project of the Council of Canadians.

Reacting to the news of the UN agency sign-on to the WWC, Anil Naidoo of the Blue Plant Project said “it was not unexpected, but is a disappointment. The reality is that these UN agencies have been under severe pressure for some time. I can tell you that there are many good people within the UN who are disturbed by the degree of corporate influence within their agencies”.

The WWC’s new Board of Governors will oversee and guide the Council’s work for the coming three years. The elections took place during the triennial General Assembly for which more than 280 members had gathered in Marseille, France. Through majority rule voting, the members elected the 36 Governors from 74 candidatures and appointed Loic Fauchon to continue to serve as President of the World Water Council.

The rector of UNESCO-IHE Institue for Water Education Andras Szollosi-Nagy was elected as one of the four WWC Bureau Members. UN-HABITAT Executive Director Anna Tibaijuka and the Service Chief of FAO’s Water Development and Management Unit (NRLW) Pasquale Steduto are the two other UN representatives on WWC’s board.

Several other UN agencies are WWC members. In the June 2009 membership list we find the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), the World Bank and the World Meterological Organisation (WMO).

Uganda’s Minister of State for Water Jennifer Namuyangu Byakatonda is one of the winners of a Golden Poo Award. The minister was the winner in the Sanitation Champion category.

The award ceremony took place on Thursday 15th October in the Prince Charles Cinema in London. The event was organised by PooP Creative and sponsored by the London School for Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) and the UK Department for International Development (DfID) as part of the Global Handwashing Day activities in the UK.

The Golden Poo Award for Hygiene Champion went to Mary Swai and Rebecca Budimu from Tanzania.

Golden Poo Award winners Rebecca Budimu (back left) and Mary Swai (back right) with children in Tanzania. Photo: UNICEF

Mary Swa is Head of the Environmental Sanitation and Hygiene section of the Tanzanian Ministry of Health and Social Welfare, and Rebecca Budimu is WASH Specialist from UNICEF Tanzania’s Young Child Survival and Development Section. The award was collected by the High Commissioner of Tanzania on behalf of the winners.

Ms. Budimu has been working with UNICEF as a Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) specialist for the past 14 years, often as the only WASH staff member in the country. As a child, Rebecca’s family did not have a latrine, but instead used the bush. This experience reinforced her commitment and understanding for adoption of good hygiene and sanitation practices – particularly at the household level.

In her work, Ms. Budimu has focused on raising awareness about the benefits of improved hygiene and sanitation issues as well as championed and supported local artisans on latrine construction.

Ms. Swai has spearheaded the development and revision of hygiene promotion tools in Tanzania. She advocates for increased community engagement and innovative approaches as viable solutions.

Golden Poo Award video

The remaining Gold Poo Awards went to the winners of an animated film competition set up by PooP Creative and The London International Animation Festival. The audience in the Prince Charles Cinema gave their votes to:

• Number ONE film Dancing In The Loo by Delphine Mandin
• Number TWO film A Film About Poo by Emily Howells and Anne Wilkins
• Runner-up film Are You Spreading Poo? by Rob and Tom Sears

The final prize, the SUDS! Hygiene Poster Competition Golden Poo Certificate, was jointly awarded to Chloe Izzard and Amy Murphy.

Below are three prize winning animation films.

Number ONE film Dancing In The Loo by Delphine Mandin

Number TWO film A Film About Poo by Emily Howells and Anne Wilkins

Runner-up film Are You Spreading Poo? by Rob and Tom Sears

Source: Golden Poo Awards web site ; UNICEF, 16 Oct 2009

Bartender Doc Hendley, whose nonprofit Wine to Water has brought sustainable water systems to 25,000 people in five countries, has been chosen as one of the Top 10 CNN Heroes of 2009.

The year 2009 marks CNN’s third annual global search for everyday individuals changing the world. Since February 2009, the network has aired weekly profiles of CNN Heroes, chosen from more than 9,000 nominations submitted by viewers in 100 countries. A panel, including retired four-star Gen. Colin Powell, philanthropist Wallis Annenberg and Sir Elton John, chose this year’s Top 10 CNN Heroes.

Doc Hendley

Since 2004, Hendley has traveled to Sudan, Ethiopia, Uganda and Cambodia, working with local communities to build clean water wells and sanitation systems.

The 30-year-old first learned about the world’s water crisis when he took a break from college, and his job as a bar-keep, to travel the world. “I began seeing the figures [of] people that don’t have access to clean water — and it absolutely floored me,” he recalls.

After returning to school, Hendley realized that just by using his ability to bartend and create relationships with people, he might be able to help the problem. At the bars where he worked, he solicited evenings to host wine tastings and provide information about the global crisis. By graduation, Hendley’s “Wine to Water” events had yielded enough funding to implement water projects in the developing world.

He approached a local contact, Kenny Isaacs of Samaritan’s Purse, with the intention of handing over the funds for their international charitable water projects. Instead, Hendley found himself in Sudan in the spring of 2004, training to oversee water projects and developing and installing water systems in zones deemed too dangerous for United Nations aide workers — all in the midst of civil war.

“[I was] seeing these people living in conflicts, bullets whizzing by their ears — yet their biggest concern was the huge loss of life because of the unclean water,” he recalls. “That’s when water changed from being my passion to the burden of my life.”

After a year of service in Darfur, Hendley returned to the States and continued his fundraising events while focusing on ways his group could improve upon other water project models.

“Throughout the desert there were bore holes [for wells] all over the place, they just weren’t working,” says Hendley. “Organizations would put a brand new, $15,000 bore hole in a village that already had one; [they] didn’t stop to think that maybe that one is broken or just needs some parts.”

Wine to Water is dedicated to achieving sustainability through education and empowerment of local community members, training them to install, maintain and repair their own water systems. Hendley has found this approach reduces overhead costs, leaving more for investment in water initiatives and local economies. Because his operation is small, Hendley says he’s less deterred by the instability of areas in dire need and is able to access pockets of the world that larger organizations may have to avoid.

To date, Hendley’s group has worked in five developing countries, including India, bringing safe drinking water to more than 25,000 individuals in refugee camps, orphanages, schools, hospitals and a leper colony, as well as directly into hundreds of homes through the installation of bio-sand filters.

In the face of the overwhelming global crisis, Hendley says his work may be a drop in the bucket, but to him it’s nothing short of a miracle.

In addition to receiving $25,000, Headly and the other Top 10 CNN Heroes will be honored at “CNN Heroes: An All-Star Tribute,” airing from the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood on 26 November 2009. In an online poll that is open until 19 November, the public will determine which of the Heroes will receive an additional $100,000.

Vote for Doc Hendley!

Source: CNN, 02 Oct 2009 and CNN profile of Doc Hendley, 01 May 2009

“Aware of its poor image in many parenting circles, Nestlé did something last week that more and more companies are doing. It went to the blogosphere to elicit a more positive buzz”, writes Linda Lowen in her blog post of 5 October 2009. “The company invited 20 top mommybloggers (and a couple of dads too) to go to California on an two-day all-expense-paid trip to meet with its U.S. CEO, a Nestlé chef and a fitness expert”.

“Hoping to convince 20 mommybloggers to say nice things about their products, [Nestlé] have inadvertently opened the floodgates for hundreds of bloggers and thousands of readers (unfamiliar with Nestlé’s formula sales in Third World nations or the Boycott Nestlé movement) to learn more about the company’s less savory practices”, Lowen concludes.

In the introduction of her blog post, Lowen dwells on the dangers of promoting infant formula in developing countries. “Mix it with unsafe drinking water in bottles that aren’t sterilized and babies can get sick and even die. These are very real problems in underdeveloped countries where contaminated water and little understanding of the need to sterilize (or lack of equipment to do so) often lead to diarrhea in infants, which in turn can cause death. Even babies fed formula mixed with clean water are at risk of malnourishment when well-meaning mothers who can’t afford enough formula thin it with additional water to extend it. For these and other reasons, it’s estimated that over a million babies die each year because they are bottle-fed instead of breastfed”.

Nestlé is also trying to create goodwill in the water sector through its sponsorship of the Stockholm International Water Week and a special focus on water in its Creating Shared Value programme. The new Nestlé Prize in Creating Shared Value is offering US$ 470,000 for an innovative water project.

São Paulo state water utility Sabesp has signed a technical cooperation agreement with federal district water utility Caesb, according to a Sabesp release [03 Sep 2009, in Portuguese].

The five-year agreement allows the utilities to form partnerships for water, sewerage, solid waste and energy projects, both in Brazil and abroad.

Under the terms of the document, the utilities will exchange technologies to reduce and control water loss and develop joint software and automated systems. The firms will also share their experiences of fundraising in capital markets, among other actions.

This is Sabesp’s sixth interstate agreement. The utility has already signed agreements with Rio Grande do Sul utility Corsan, Alagoas’ Casal, Paraíba’s Cagepa, Santa Catarina’s Casan and Espírito Santo’s Cesan.

[In 2009] the company also signed international cooperation agreements with Costa Rican water utility AyA and Spanish sanitation company Aguas de Barcelona (Agbar).

Caesb provides 93% of the federal district’s urban population with potable water and sewerage services. All sewage is treated.

Source: BNamericas.com [subscription site], 08 Sep 2009

Actresses Jessica Biel and Isabel Lucas are joining up with rapper Lupe Fiasco to climb Africa’s highest peak – Mount Kilimanjaro, to raise awareness about the need for clean water worldwide.

The Summit on the Summit expedition, set for January 2009, is the brainchild of singer and producer Kenna. His father suffered from waterborne diseases as a child in Ethiopia.

Biel, 27, said she was “astonished” to learn that more than a billion people across the globe have no access to clean water.

Justin Timberlake – who’s been romantically linked with Biel – may also be joining the climbers.

Kenna said more celebrity climbers will be announced in the coming months.

Funds raised will support clean water projects implemented by Procter & Gamble’s Children’s Safe Drinking Water (CSDW) Program, UNHCR and Play Pumps International. Procter & Gamble Co.’s PUR water treatment brand and HP are sponsoring the Summit on the Summit.

Dr. Greg Allgood, Founder and Director of the CSDW Program, will also be joining the climb as one of the Summit on the Summit team’s water experts.

Source: Sandy Cohen, AP / KansasCity.com, 24 Sep 2009 ; PR Newswire, 29 Sep 2009

An agreement was reached earlier in 2009 to transfer the hosting of the Water Supply and Sanitation Collaborative Council (WSSCC) Secretariat from the World Health Organization (WHO) to the service provider arm of the United Nations, UNOPS. The transfer of host operations is occurring in stages and will be completed by 31 December 2009. UNOPS, which is based in Copenhagen, has a brief to expand the capacity of the UN to implement its peace-building, humanitarian and development operations, and it undertakes project management, procurement and other support services to United Nations agencies and other international organisations.

In related news, the WSSCC announces that it has been accepted as a member of the World Water Council (WWC).

Source: WSSCC News, Sep 2009

Relief International (RI), a relief and development organisation based in California has joined forces with EnterpriseWorks/VITA (EWV), a Washington, D.C. based non-profit that combats global poverty through sustainable, enterprise-oriented solutions. The merger was announced on July 1st, 2009.

Founded in 1990, RI has offices and operations in 19 countries with a focus on bridging relief to development. Emergency water supply services are part of RI’s Shelter & Infrastructure program. EWV (originally Appropriate Technology International and later merged with Volunteers in Technical Assistance) has for more than four decades helped millions of small producers and other entrepreneurs.

EWV’s water and sanitation programme includes development and distribution of products include drilling and lifting technologies, water filters for potable water, and small-scale irrigation solutions.

“The synergy between RI and EWV is a natural one of providing a full range of services to low-income communities. This is the future of international development aid being realized today,” says Don Feil the CEO of EWV. “Together we provide a global and sustainable approach to economic development through creating value-chains and linking the most vulnerable, marginalized and rural communities to economic opportunities.”

The combined organizations shall maintain offices in California and Washington, D.C. working together in more than 30 countries to combat global poverty through humanitarian and economic development programmes based on sustainable, enterprise-oriented solutions.

Source: EWV, 01 Jul 2009

At the end of the Global Water Partnership’s (GWP) Consulting Partners meeting and the start of the Stockholm World Water Week, a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed between the GWP and the European Water Partnership (EWP) on 16 August 2009.

In the MoU, both organisations acknowledged their “common interest in improving water resources management for
sustainable development” and stated their willingness to collaborate on:

• organization of and participation in meetings, conferences, symposia, workshops, courses, and exhibitions on fields of interest to both signatories
• identification, development and implementation of joint research and projects, including the exchange of their results
• facilitation of implementation of EU water policies and legislation. by bringing key stakeholders together for dialogues and other activities at all levels from regional to national and local levels in order to create public awareness and shared ownership
• contributing to the vision mapping process for Europe by sharing experience, information and documentation as well as by actively participating in working meetings on the vision mapping and participating in the European Policy Summit
• sharing experience in awareness-raising, capacity building, knowledge exchange and water governance
• sharing experience on addressing climate change issues and contributing to the European Dialogue on Climate Change Adaptation and Water.

Source: GWP, 26 Aug 2009