WASH Drilling in Northern Unity State The humanitarian situation in South Sudan has deteriorated significantly over the last year paralleling an intensification of violence in recent months. Protracted conflict has compounded the water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) needs of already vulnerable displaced populations and placed undue stress on existing infrastructure of host communities. Coping abilities have been further eroded by prolonged food insecurity, economic collapse and disease outbreaks. Moreover, a widespread lack of safe drinking water, improved sanitation facilities and poor hygiene practices has left a large proportion of the population at risk of preventable WASH related diseases, leaving as many as 4.2 million vulnerable individuals in need of critical life-saving WASH services in 2016.

This project will provide emergency WASH services for up to 8,000 vulnerable internally displaced people (IDPs) and host community members in Abiemnom, Mayom and/or Pariang counties of Northern Unity State. The proposed WASH intervention is aimed at improving water and sanitation infrastructure in target communities through drilling 16 new boreholes for improved safe water access. Project activities are integrated to provide an all-inclusive WASH approach that combines behavior change in hygiene, sanitation, and water access with sustainability of efforts through training of 16 health and hygiene committees (HHCs), 16 community water-management committees (WMCs) and 16 hand pump mechanics to strengthen community management capacities and encourage local ownership.	
	
Conflict-affected women and girls will be specifically targeted to benefit from this project as they continue to be disproportionality affected by protection related WASH issues, with gender based violence (GBV) occurring due to insufficient and unsafe access to water and sanitation facilities. The specific needs of menstruating women will be addressed through community-led menstrual hygiene management (MHM) awareness training sessions. Samaritan’s Purse (SP) will also install additional needs-specific changing and sanitation facilities at 40 gender-segregated (female) emergency latrines and/or alternative community-selected private locations where women feel safe and provide MHM kits to up to 2,000 vulnerable females.	

The WASH needs are closely linked to those of health and nutrition, exemplified in the diarrhea-malnutrition cycle which is prevalent in vulnerable populations and water borne epidemics that disproportionately affect children under five (U5). As such, the project will also help address the underlying WASH needs related to malnutrition in these areas by improving water access and sanitation practices. A nutrition component will be included in the health and hygiene training to encourage appropriate feeding of young children, raise awareness of food-nutrient content/ preparation, and good maintenance of small household vegetable gardens in order to mitigate the underlying causes of malnutrition and susceptibility to WASH-related illness.

Watering cans for communal use will be provided to each WMC (minimum of eight per committee) to assist vulnerable households in the watering of their gardens to improve vegetative conditions. Additional WASH non-food items (NFIs), such as jerry cans, buckets and soap and gloves will be used in trainings and distributed to beneficiaries based on availability from the cluster pipeline.