PROJECT SUMMARY

The objective of the project was to improve food security, water sanitation and hygiene infrastructure as well as productive asset rehabilitation to flood affected communities in Matobo district by December 2017. This objective will be achieved through the following three outcomes:

1. Improved access to safe and clean water for 4’500 beneficiaries in 3 wards until December 2017.
   This outcome will be achieved through drilling of 9 boreholes in the selected villages in 3 wards. Boreholes have not been drilled as project funds have not been received.
2. Improved access to safe sanitation facilities for 1’800 school pupils and 10 schoolteachers in the 6 wards by December 2017.
   This will be achieved through construction of 92 squat holes in 10 schools and currently, 7 schools are at siting and pegging stage whilst 3 are at pit digging.
3. Improved community’s behaviour concerning the prevention of water, sanitation, and hygiene related diseases within the target community of 6’310 beneficiaries in 9 wards until December 2017.
   This outcome will be achieved through training of school health teachers and formation of school health clubs. The project has so far identified schoolteachers to be trained.

ACTIVITIES DONE AND RESULTS OBTAINED

Project inception

The project inception workshop was conducted on the 8^th of June 2017. All the relevant district stakeholders attended the meeting which was held at the Matobo Rural district Council boardroom.

Among the stakeholders were the District Drought Relief Committee, the District Civil Protection Committee, Matobo Rural District Council and the District Administrator’s office and representatives from Heks Eper.

It was agreed at the meeting that the project should start as soon as possible because the situation in the ground needed for immediate interventions.

In total 37 people attended the project inception meeting. The meeting further agreed that stakeholders should take an active role in project implementation especially when the inception is done at ward and village level and when targeting is being conducted.

Project funds have not yet been received and this has delayed implementation of other activities.

This meeting was jointly organized between Fambidzanai and Moriti, district Stakeholders and councillors from the project wards attended the District Inception meeting.

The objective of the meeting was to give an outline of the project in general and to ensure that support for project activities would be given by the Stakeholders.

School meetings                        

Meetings with school headmasters from St Luxius Primary, Zamanyoni Primary, Mahetshe Primary, Fumugwe Primary, Bazha Secondary, Silozwi Primary, Fort Usher Primary, Tohwe Secondary, Halale Primary and Lukadzi Primary were conducted to inform them about the project.

All these headmasters expressed their gratitude and promised to work with the organisation in fulfilling the goals of the project. This activity was done to secure that schools give their necessary support and participate in the project activities.

Community meetings

Communities led by the traditional leaders were mobilized and the project activities were shared with them. The communities promised to support the project with their presence and physical participation to help bring normalcy with regards to access to basic services.

These community processes were done by both organisations in their respective wards and in accordance with the different objectives.

Water access

• Community members were engaged to pre-select 3 sites per borehole for borehole drilling using Indigenous Knowledge System. All these pre-sites will be verified by the qualified surveyor in the presence of the communities. Pre-selection was done at Malaba village for 3 boreholes, Mtsuli Village for 1 borehole, Mazwi village for 1 borehole, Holi village for 1 borehole, Woodlands village for 1 borehole, Betseba village for 1 borehole and Mavule village for 1 borehole.
• The selection of Water Point User Committees was also conducted in these villages, and they were encouraged to be on standby so that as soon as the drilling has been completed they will receive CBM training. Amongst the water point users, one caretaker was selected who will be trained for basic maintenance of the boreholes. Communities have been mobilised to start gathering locally available materials which will be needed for the headworks construction once the drilling has been done.

Sanitation access

• Prior to the allocation of the squat holes per school, the verification process was conducted by the Moriti and the Ministry of Health- Environmental Health Department to rationalize the allocation. This resulted in the following: –

This allocation was done using a ratio of one squat hole to 20 pupils and considering as well as the intensity of destruction by Cyclone Dineo.

• Siting and pegging of multi-compartments BVIP latrines by the local Environmental Health Technician (EHT) are in progress in 7 schools and 3 schools are at pit digging. Community members for Mahetshe Primary School, Tokwe Secondary School, Fumugwe Primary School and Bazha Secondary School have started mobilization of resources which are pit sand, river sand as well as bricks. 

Hygiene Promotion

Teachers to be trained as School Health Teachers have been mobilized at Tokwe Secondary, Bazha Secondary, Mahetshe Primary and Fumugwe Primary. This is work in progress in other schools. This activity has been done in preparation for the training of School Health Teachers (SHT) on Participatory Health and Hygiene Education (PHHE) as this will contribute to improving hygiene promotion at schools.

DIFFICULTIES FACED DURING IMPLEMENTATION

The major difficulty has been the delay in the disbursement of funds. We managed to complete a few activities which did not require funding.

MILESTONES ACHIEVED

• The stakeholder sensitisation and inception meeting was successfully done and completed on time.

CHALLENGES ENCOUNTERED  

• The project was supposed to be incepted by the communities at ward and village level but this has delayed due to late disbursements of funds. The project inception at ward and village leveL will then be done in July 2017.