Introduction

Casamance is often called the pantry of Senegal, is located in the south of the country and is surrounding Gambia. It is at 12,5°N, this means about 1300 km in the north of the equateur with a subtropical forest. During the dry season the water quality is varying between good and bad and can be treated with javel. During the rainy season (hivernage, 4 -5 month), the rainwater is collected. The water quality in the non- concreted wells is deteriorating through all kind of infiltrations. During that season, the diseases like the diarrhoea and the malaria is increasing. The doctors of the NGO ANIMA are estimating that 1/3 of the inhabitants, in particularly the children and the elderly people are concerned. The apparition of diarrhoea is part of the daily life and is becoming a habit.
SODIS can present an efficient solution during the whole year.

Project Zone

The project covers a part of the Casamance, principally in the north of the Casamance River. The 20 villages are very scattered and can only be reached by boat. Only ¾ of the population have access in different ways to drinking water. In almost every village, it exist a medical centre with medical personnel and a minimum of medicine. There is no electrical supply in the villages.

Implementation Strategy

Based on our experiences made after discussing it with the local official instances in the field, the project has decided to do the SODIS promotion with small groups instead of putting a lot of energy to convince big organisation, which are not motivated and effective..
Our principle are the followings:

o train the teachers on the SODIS-Methods and support them during their lectures
o Train the health worker, which are assuring the contacts with the families
o Assure a bottle supply system
o Organise SODIS meeting through the trainers accompanied with theatre, dance and music
o Supervise and monitor the work twice a year in the field through the Swiss team.
o continue to motivate the NGO to engage in SODIS promotion

Project Partners

The Casamance has experienced a long period of war and the peace accord has been signed the 30th decembre 2004 between the MFDC and the senegalese state. The peace has come back, but the problem of a separation is not solved. The regional water directeur in Ziguinchor has welcomed the project and has given green light to the promotion of SODIS in his region. Until now no problems were encoutered during the projets activities.
The project has a strong collaboration with esf (Enseignants sans Frontières Suisse), who is also working in the Casamance with the school teachers. They have included the SODIS in their training seminars since this year.
The project is also in contact with CREPA in Dakar, who could be a partner organisation for the projects in the north of the country.
The project has drawn an organigram, which includes the chief trainer and 3 trainers responsible for the three sectors. 75 health worker and teacher, the so-called promoters are in charge of the promotion in the villages and schools.

Expected results/Achievements

- Reduce the waterborne disease
- Assure the existing structure to function the whole year smoothly
- The right utilisation of the SODIS method of trained people is guaranteed.
- The monitoring of the diarrhoea cases is in place (in particularly for the children under 5 years) and an amelioration of the health status can be demonstrated after two years.
- The people should be self-responsible after a maximum of 5 years.

Lessons learnt

- A SODIS project needs a strong commitment of 3 to 5 years to assure a sustainable impact.
- Changing habits in Africa needs more time than in Latin America per example.
- The bottle supply is a decisive factor for the success of the a project.
- The collaboration with a medical group brings very positives synergies like the exchange of results and the better acceptation of the method within the population.
- SODIS is an effective, cheap and simple method.