WaterSHED Shares Sanitation Marketing Experience in Laos

From 4-8 June 2012, WateSHED  shared lessons from its successful ‘Hands-off’ sanitation marketing program in Cambodia with sector stakeholders in Lao PDR. The Laotian Ministry of Health invited the WaterSHED team to lead a discussion in Vientiane on the key elements of its program with government and NGO representatives of the water and sanitation sector. In Savannakhet Province the WaterSHED team worked with Provincial authorities on a scoping and fact-finding mission for potential replication of the Hands-Off approach. In collaboration with the NGO, Plan, WaterSHED also visited Bokeo Province to explore opportunities to leverage Plan’s successful Community led Total Sanitation (CLTS) activities by implementing a complementary sanitation marketing program. WaterSHED’s approach in Cambodia has sparked a thriving rural sanitation market and the trip served as an opportunity to influence the development of a new market for sanitation in the region.