Improvement of WASH services aiming to mitigate WASH-related gender based violence for IDPs, host communities, returnees in Yirol East County, Lakes State Polish Humanitarian Action (PAH) will conduct life-saving WASH activities aimed at meeting the the life-threatening, severe needs of the population of IDPs, host community and returnees. This project will be implemented in Yirol East county which was affected by conflict, natural disasters, high malnutrition rates, disease outbreaks and GBV threats. PAH will have a static presence in both locations with flexibility to address needs across the whole counties, as part of crisis modifier strategy. The project aims to support the provision of access to safe and sufficient water to vulnerable and affected populations, increase knowledge of appropriate hygiene practices to prevent and mitigate WASH-related diseases and aims to reduce gender-based violence-related issues in occurrences. Since women and girls are the primary, direct users of WASH services, the project will contribute to GBV mitigation among the targeted population. The project will implement life-saving integrated WASH and GBV activities, targeting 15 000 individual beneficiaries suffering from inadequate access to safe drinking water, inadequate sanitation and poor hygiene conditions. 
The interventions will include: 
(1) Safe water provision through borehole construction and rehabilitation, ensuring access to water for the affected communities, where safe access to water points mitigates risks for girls, women and children.
(2) Provision or rehabilitation of sanitation infrastructure (latrines, hand washing facilities and solid waste management) will be supported at the institutional level and IDP sites. At the HH level the latrine construction with local materials will be encouraged with GBV prevention aspect taken into consideration for latrine design 
(3) Hygiene promotion (handwashing campaigns in communities and institutions, safe water chain, safe solid waste disposal and jerry-can cleaning campaigns) 
(4) Capacity-building of community institutions (pump mechanics, water user committees, community hygiene promoters, nutrition workers, school's hygiene clubs) 
(5) Distribution of WASH NFIs (soap, hygiene kits, menstrual hygiene kit, water containers, PUR or others) for the most vulnerable people in the community 
(6) Capacity building of WASH partners and harmonizing of WASH activities at the state level and transitional recovery activities on the national level on behalf of WASH Cluster.
The activities will include a detailed multi-sector needs assessment to identify the needs, affected gender, age and diversity groups, the vulnerabilities of the targeted community and coping strategies of the affected population. The main priority is to provide emergency WASH necessary to reduce morbidity and mortality caused by WASH-related diseases, contributing to malnutrition and limited access to water. The project design aims to integrate with other projects in other sectors for a holistic response. This will include skills training and resilience building. The project aims at centralizing protection to promote principled access to basic services to vulnerable groups at risk, accountability to affected people ensuring that services are delivered in a gender-sensitive manner and will consider the needs of different gender and age groups, people living with disabilities, etc. With the involvement of our MEAL (Monitoring, Evaluation, Accountability and Learning) department, the indicators will track cooperation with communities through an existing beneficiary feedback mechanism, to address GBV and protection threats in WASH.