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Associations for organizing small enterprises in war-affected areas of Mozambique
01.09.1992
The war in Mozambique has left towns in Zambezia Province with crippled infrastructure and populated by displaced people. A project initiated by Save the Children Fund has established associations of artisans which have been organized to supply the basic requirements of the population in return for wages. Conceived primarily as a relief and rehabilitation project, the associations have some potential to foster entrepreneurship among their members, although the transition to self-reliance and autonomy is seen to be problematic. -
Measuring progress towards sanitation and hygiene targets: a critical review of monitoring methodologies and technologies
01.01.2022
The Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) target for access to safe sanitation and hygiene represents a marked improvement over the target used during the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) period. The SDG target attempts to: explicitly address hygiene; eliminate inequalities within populations; evaluate sanitation services beyond the household; account for the accessibility, safety, acceptability, and affordability of service delivery; and improve the sustainability of services (WHO/UNICEF, 2015). However, the proposed indicators for monitoring progress in sanitation and hygiene still rely primarily on infrequent household surveys and census data. This paper provides a critical review of the sanitation and hygiene target and explores the potential gaps between the expanded understanding of access, the proposed monitoring strategies, and the desired impacts. A variety of innovative methodologies and technologies are reviewed, with specific attention given to their suitability for measuring and monitoring progress towards the sanitation and hygiene target. -
Intensifying the social performance and sustainability of microfinance institutions to address the social challenge of sanitation: an Indian case study
01.10.2015
The microfinance model has helped to address the world’s social challenges to some extent. Sanitation is one of the world’s social challenges and microfinance can be used as an intervention tool to address this. Worldwide 1.04 billion people still practise open defecation, accounting for 15 per cent of the world population, and of which 594 million are Indians. To address this sanitation problem, Bharathi Women Development Centre (Bharathi), a Tamil Nadu-based non-government organization, used its microfinance programme and group network to educate about the need for toilets, and provided the resources and technical know – how to construct latrines in individual households. So far they have successfully constructed 14,609 toilets by providing microcredit and have experienced no difficulties in repayments of loans, by which it is proved to be a sustainable programme. Bharathi has faced many challenges while implementing this project, such as raising debt fund for on-lending to its sanitation portfolio; shifting the culture of open defecation after construction of toilets, especially with male members of the family; establishing a technical know – how workforce to construct the toilets in rural areas; helping the poorest of the poor to not be burdened by the sanitation loan because of its non-income generating nature; and maintaining the low-cost construction of toilets. This study illustrates how a relatively small NGO microfinance institution was able to create a niche market and implement a sustainable sanitation programme along with its routine microfinance programme by providing awareness, technical assistance, and credit to construct toilets. -
The limitations of roofwater harvesting in developing countries
01.04.2014
Many tropical countries often have poorly performing or absent piped-water supplies in their rural and suburban areas. Fetching water from point sources such as wells is often arduous and such sources are vulnerable to pollution. Domestic roofwater harvesting (DRWH in this article) is a promising alternative self-supply technology and is supported by many agencies and associations. However take-up of DRWH has been very limited due to the six constraints discussed in this article. These are: inadequacy of annual roof run-off volume; excessive cost; difficulty of water management; uncertain water quality; poor installation/maintenance/longevity; and ugliness. While these constraints rule against DRWH becoming a universal first choice for less economically developed countries, (LEDC) domestic water supply, there are many specific scenarios where it outperforms, or is cheaper than, the alternatives. The paper identifies some of these scenarios and also how the constraints can be minimized by prudent application and ongoing R&D. -
Measuring progress towards sanitation and hygiene targets: a critical review of monitoring methodologies and technologies
01.07.2018
The Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) target for access to safe sanitation and hygiene represents a marked improvement over the target used during the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) period. The SDG target attempts to: explicitly address hygiene; eliminate inequalities within populations; evaluate sanitation services beyond the household; account for the accessibility, safety, acceptability, and affordability of service delivery; and improve the sustainability of services (WHO/UNICEF, 2015). However, the proposed indicators for monitoring progress in sanitation and hygiene still rely primarily on infrequent household surveys and census data. This paper provides a critical review of the sanitation and hygiene target and explores the potential gaps between the expanded understanding of access, the proposed monitoring strategies, and the desired impacts. A variety of innovative methodologies and technologies are reviewed, with specific attention given to their suitability for measuring and monitoring progress towards the sanitation and hygiene target. -
The quality of informal sector manufactures in Nairobi
01.12.1995
The products of informal sector manufacturers are commonly thought to be suitable for consumers in developing countries on account of their low price and simplicity: they represent 'quality for the poor' rather than 'poor quality'. This article questions this assumption, and by surveying middle-class and poor consumers in Nairobi it reveals that typical informal sector products are regarded as of inferior quality and often more unreliable than imported or mass-produced goods. Clearly there will need to be significant improvements in design and production if informal sector products are to continue selling on domestic markets, let alone internationally. -
Replicating the Grameen Bank – the Latin American Experience
01.06.1995
The Grameen Bank's success in lending to microenterprises, and particularly women, using solidarity groups, is well known. Attempts have been made to replicate the model outside Bangladesh, and much of this work taking place in rural African and Asian projects has been written about before. This article describes urban solidarity-group lending in Latin America, and evaluates the success of such attempts in terms of project efficiency and of benefits to the borrowers. The evidence is that a number of long-standing micro-lending projects have achieved reasonable efficiency levels, even though evidence of changes brought about by the loans in the borrowers' enterprises is difficult to come by, and suggests quite modest improvements. -
The Triple Trust – a three-fold approach
01.03.1990
The Triple Trust Organization, an autonomous, independent body in the private sector, was formed in September 1988 in response to the need for self-employment opportunities in the fast-growing black community in the area immediately surrounding Cape Town, South Africa, where the problems of unemployment are particularly acute. The vision is to help people to help themselves by means of a three-fold approach – training, financing and marketing support – working through existing community organizations.