Emergency WASH Response for IDPs and conflict-affected communities in Upper Nile State Less than half of the population has access to clean water and adequate sanitation facilities in South Sudan. Recent displacement has worsened the situation of both IDPs and host communities. Hygiene practices, such as open defecation, put people at risk of disease where the population is highly concentrated as is the case in displacement sites. Access to water and sanitation remains a major issue in 2016, aggravate the risk of malnutrition. The lack of safe drinking water, in combination with and poor hygiene practices also leaves a large proportion of South Sudan’s population at persistent risk of preventable waterborne diseases. The 2010 South Sudan Household Health Survey indicates that less than 23% of people have access safe drinking water, with coverage rates of adequate sanitation at just 12.7%. About two thirds of the population has no access to sanitation facilities and only 10.5 per cent treat water to ensure it is safe to drink. These statistics are prior to the current crisis. The recent violence and large-scale displacement to sites and areas without sufficient access to clean water and proper sanitation has greatly increased the vulnerability of people displaced, with these above statistics likely worse for violence affected communities.

RI has conducted two needs assessments and surveys in Upper Nile State through 2014 and 2015, including a rapid multi-sector household survey and a qualitative mapping assessment of WASH service providers in Maban and Longechuk. Recent assessments conducted by RI in Longechuk have found people rarely treat drinking water (92 percent), and distance travelled to water sources varied significantly across and within surveyed payams. It took 50 percent of respondents one hour or more to collect water. The majority of households collected between 40 and 60 liters of water per day. With an average household size of six, this falls well below 15 liters per person each day. Findings from RI's ongoing WASH program has found that the rampant open defecation together with poor hygiene practices aggravate health issues and heighten the risk of disease outbreak (e.g. cholera). In addition, most households were found to be using dried calabash plants and open plastic buckets (without covers or lids) for water storage. In some payams, households are relying on small jerry cans with a storage capacity of only five litres. As a result of limited water storage capacity, frequent trips to watering sources are required. 

To address these needs, RI’s proposed program will rehabilitate existing damaged and abandoned water points and rain water harvesting systems. RI will also construct owner driven household and / or family shared latrines within displaced and conflict-affected communities to ensure their immediate sanitation needs are properly met with appropriate and culturally accepted sanitation facilities. Finally, solid waste management training will be provided to solid waste / hygiene committees to implement community-driven solid waste collection and disposal campaigns. RI will implement large-scale hygiene promotion and awareness activities to further reinforce and influence behavior change in hygiene practices through different approaches of hygiene promotion campaigns (including, house to house hygiene education, training of hygiene volunteers in the communities, and the distribution of appropriated hygiene and WASH NFI kits).