ILE, Jakarta, Indonesia, November 2016

On 14 - 18 November 2016, 160 Experts from 16 Asian countries came together in Jakarta to exchange their experience regarding innovative WASH in Schools (WinS) approaches. The 5th WASH in Schools International Learning Exchange (ILE), was hosted by the Ministry of Education and Culture of Indonesia – with support from UNICEF and GIZ.

The conference concluded with a general agreement among the participants that WinS goes beyond building toilets and providing water supply. Ensuring WinS requires clear arrangements for cleaning and maintenance, providing supplies, changing hygiene behaviors, along with monitoring, financing, and coordination at each level. Political will and leadership from the education sector are key ingredients, as well as the involvement of parents and communities. While the issues are broad and approaches to addressing them depend on each country’s context, future ILEs will continue to provide concrete ideas for doing WinS better.

Please find the WinS ILE Conference Report and the ILE Outcome Report in the SuSanA library.

Watch the WASH in Schools country videos

In preparation for the ILE, each country delegation was asked to develop a short video showcasing their respective WinS activities. This format was chosen to initiate a critical reflection at country level about the most important programme features and achievements that should be part of a scripted creative video presentation. On the first day of the conference, the videos were presented in batches of three to four followed by panel discussions to allow delegations to respond to questions from other participants.

Below, you can watch the videos for Afghanistan, Bhangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, Democratic People's Republic of Korea, Fiji, Lao PDR, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan, People's Republic of China, Philippines, Solomon Islands, Sri Lanka and Vanatu.

The variety and creativity of the videos showed an impressive range of activities in the participating countries and provided useful entry points for lively discussions. While some countries are at the start of their WinS journey, others have already made significant progress. Despite these differences, all videos showed crucial learnings and success factors that help in moving beyond the common challenges that WinS programmes are facing. (see Chapter “3.Country Reports” of the WinS ILE Conference Report for a summary of these common learnings and challenges)