UNICEF Child Protection and WASH System strengthening in Sudan

The Programme on Child Protection and WASH System Strengthening in Sudan will be implemented between January December 2024 in relatively stable areas, such as Gezira and River Nile states. In these states, 130,000 most vulnerable conflict-affected children and family members will be reached with sustainable WASH services and over 15,000 children and people in need with child protection prevention and response through direct interventions. The programme aims to strengthen social welfare and WASH systems at state and local level to ensure the delivery of integrated services in building individual and collective resilience and empowerment of vulnerable communities and households, through provision of increased access to protection services and basic sustainable water, sanitation, and hygiene services. This will be achieved through support to the social service workforce and frontline workers in the host communities receiving high number of displaced people and through effective community mobilisation grounded in participatory action, gender transformative approaches, with a focus on sustainable services, community engagement throughout planning, designing and delivering of services to reduce risks of gender-based violence and other protection concerns, including harmful practices while also empowering women and girls to participate in decision making processes and management of community assets such as water resources. Expected impact/results WASH service provision will be enhanced in vulnerable communities, ensuring integration with child protection, education, and health and nutrition sectors. This will be delivered through a mix of hardware and software interventions. Hardware interventions will include the rehabilitation or construction of water and sanitation infrastructure in communities, child friendly spaces and health centres. The software component will include social mobilization through CLTS approach to stop open defecation in the communities, and the promotion of hygiene practices, especially handwashing at critical times. This will be complemented by activities aimed at ensuring sustainability of the WASH services, such as empowering communities in the management of water facilities by establishing and training of institutionalised WASH Committees, putting in place WASH information management systems both at locality and state level to better track progress and address inequities and enhancing capacities of locality and community level WASH practitioners.