Comprehensive Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene assistance to restore services and reduce public health risks for the most severely conflict-affected areas in Iraq By early 2018, Iraq began its transition into a post-conflict context as the military conflict and occupations by armed opposition group (AOG) came to an end. The intensity of the conflict led to a widespread destruction of or damage to infrastructure, a consequent disruption of basic services, and a large scale displacement of affected people. Many water networks and water treatment plants were heavily damaged and their equipment was stolen, while the sanitation and water supply facilities at schools and healthcare facilities that had been co-opted for different uses during the conflict were damaged or fell into disrepair. Even with the end of the conflict and the slow returns of displaced people, water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) services in many severely affected locations continue to remain disrupted or operating at low or fluctuating capacities. Without an integrated response to restore services and promote safe hygiene practices, many people living in or returning to these areas remain deprived of sufficient life-sustaining WASH services and remain at risk of a consequent deterioration of their health status. Moreover, a lack of services continues to be a highly cited reasons for people choosing to remain in vulnerable situations of protracted displacement. 

In order to address these needs, the applying consortium of 6 partners, Terre des Hommes (Tdh) – Lausanne, Arche Nova (AN), World Vision (WV), Polish Humanitarian Action (PAH), Sorouh for Sustainable Development Foundation (SSDF), and Janat Al-Frdaws Foundation for Relief and Development (JF), proposes to undertake a comprehensive and integrated 8-month WASH intervention in 13 of the 14 highly prioritized, severely affected districts in Ninewa, Salah Addin, and Diyala governorates. The proposed intervention will (1.) seek to improve access to safe water, exceeding the SPHERE standards, at community levels through the 7 rehabilitation of Water Networks and 2 Water Treatment Plants and other facilities, (2.) equitably improve the availability of water and sanitation facilities at 38 schools and 6 health facilities through a targeted rehabilitation activities and waste-management support activities, and (3.) improve hygiene practices at community, school, and health facility levels through gender-tailored hygiene promotion activities, and the distribution of gender-tailored hygiene items, benefiting an estimated 113,057 people. All rehabilitation activities will seek the participation and training of local stakeholders in all of the design, implementation, and exit stages of the project, in order to ensure local ownership of the work and a smooth handover at the end of the project. Moreover, the intervention at schools (WASH in Schools) and health facilities (WASH in Health) will follow a comprehensive approach, in order to address all WASH needs of people of all ages, genders, abilities, and intersectional vulnerabilities. Furthermore, in using a consortium approach for a collaborative and coordinated implementation, the consortium will seek to develop partners’ capacities, specifically but not only supporting the consortium’s NNGO partners, through peer-learning, mentorship, targeted training, and knowledge brokerage. 

The proposed project will provide durable WASH solutions for targeted communities, ensuring that local stakeholders have ownership of the interventions and appropriate training and tools at hand to continue to operate and maintain WASH services, allowing for a sustained impact of the project’s results.