IRC Burkina has received funding for a new project on capacity building of governance for WASH in 93 municipalities.
Published on: 22/01/2020
Ouagadougou, January 8, 2020 - IRC, in collaboration with the Centre of Water Professions of the water utility ONEA, has started a project worth 2.5 million euros (1.6 billion Francs CFA) in Burkina Faso. The project is being funded by the European Union. The objective is to build the capacity of the leadership of municipalities in the governance of drinking water supply, sanitation and hygiene services (WASH). The project targets 93 municipalities in the centre-east, centre-west and centre-south regions. The project has kicked off on January 1, 2020 and will end on November 30, 2022.
The subsidy awarded by the European Union represents a significant contribution to the ambitions of the government and local authorities in Burkina Faso regarding municipal governance of WASH. The ambition of this new project is to fill the gap in capacity and practical knowledge for municipal project management while eliminating the bottlenecks in the sustainable management of infrastructures and the sustainability of WASH services. To do this, IRC's approach is to develop decision-making, organisational, planning, supervision and monitoring capacities in order to ensure the achievement of SDG 6.1 (universal access to drinking water) and SDG 6.2 (universal access to sanitation).
“We are very enthusiastic about the prospect of collaborating with ONEA, the Ministry of Water and Sanitation and the 93 targeted municipalities to meet the challenge of municipal governance of drinking water and sanitation. Since our establishment in Burkina Faso in 2012, we have gained a wealth of experience and developed a wide range of solutions which have been successfully tested. These solutions have been widely integrated into sectoral strategies and we are delighted with this opportunity which allows us to work on a large scale. For us, strengthening the capacities of municipal public authorities and making municipal technical agents available are not only the best means of ensuring the effective management of WASH infrastructures and equipment, but also the essential conditions for achieving and sustaining universal access to drinking water and sanitation. By funding this project, the European Union is giving a big boost to the operationalisation of the action plan for the implementation of assistance to the municipal authority regarding WASH, adopted by the Burkinabè government on April 18, 2018. It is a proud moment for IRC to be mandated to carry out this technical assistance project for the benefit of the government and local authorities”. - Juste Hermann Nansi, Country Director, IRC Burkina Faso.
Based on the experiences of the past ten years in various projects and missions of technical assistance and action research in Ghana, Uganda, Ethiopia and Burkina Faso, IRC has developed a robust approach for strengthening water and sanitation governance systems and actors at the municipal and central government levels. IRC's intellectual products have impacted the formulation of targets 6.1 and 6.2 of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) at international level, as well as national implementation programmes in several countries including Burkina Faso. Through its water and sanitation support programme, the European Union in Burkina Faso is making a decisive contribution to achieving SDG 6 as much by strengthening governance as by carrying out works. IRC has been collaborating with the European Union in Burkina Faso since 2014 and their joint contributions to progress in the water and sanitation sector are well recognised by the public authorities and the beneficiary populations.
For more information, please contact: burkina@ircwash.org
