November 2024 Empowering sanitation workers: Lessons from a pilot support fund Kanika Singh and Andrés Hueso González

How could the collective power of sanitation workers be strengthened so they could better advocate for their rights? The Initiative for Sanitation Workers (ISW), with support from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF), sought to explore this through a pilot Empowerment Support Fund.

This fund aimed to strengthen empowerment efforts by sanitation workers’ groups and the grassroots organizations supporting them. The purpose was to build the capacities of sanitation workers to engage with authorities and other key stakeholders, to enable them to advocate for their rights and access their entitlements. This involved activities such as expanding the membership of associations, formalizing and building networks, and strengthening leadership skills. Since 2022, ISW has provided small grants, amounting to approximately US$ 191,000 to eight organisations across Tanzania, Burkina Faso, Nigeria, India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh.

The fund is inspired by aid decolonization principles, which reduce the systemic power hierarchies between funders and grantees, such as:

• localizing the funds and decision-making power to sanitation workers’ communities and organizations;
• keeping sanitation workers’ needs central by responding to their priorities;
• tailoring support to the specific capacities of sanitation workers’ groups and local contexts;
• simplifying administrative and reporting processes, and establishing trust-based relationships based on open and responsive communication;
• ensuring flexibility in decision-making, allowing for agile implementation and continuous learning; and
• facilitating access to national and international platforms for sanitation workers’ representatives to directly voice their concerns and opinions.

For instance, during the design of the fund, sanitation workers’ organizations and experts were consulted, and an advisory committee established - with over 25 global stakeholders including six sanitation workers’ representatives/activists - that acts as a sounding board for ISW efforts more broadly.

An open call for proposals was issued for organizations to suggest activities under the broad theme of sanitation workers’ mobilization; the objectives and scope of interventions were left for the sanitation workers’ organizations to define. Given that most organizations were unfamiliar with this type of funding and had limited proposal development capacity, an iterative process was followed, whereby ISW members were available to discuss plans, provide feedback or even support proposal preparation.

Fund disbursement, monitoring, review and reporting mechanisms are kept simple and flexible, and presented in local languages, thereby reducing the administrative burden on these organizations. Partnership agreements are adapted in line with the nature of each organisation and any local regulatory requirements. In addition to financial support, ISW members provide assistance to sanitation workers’ organizations, such as facilitating access to decision makers and key sector actors and providing platforms for disseminating their work and messages. ISW also organizes peer-to-peer online exchange opportunities between all sanitation workers’ organisations.

However, the fund had its own limitations and contradictions. The short time frames due to upstream funding meant that ISW could only commit to supporting for one year. This was later extended, but only for another 18 months. Geographically, proposals were accepted only from countries where either WaterAid or SNV had a presence, for management reasons. The intensity of non-monetary support provided varied depending on the country, due to ISW member staff availability limitations.

The fact that the fund is managed by a global coalition of international institutions also contradicts the principles of decolonization to a certain extent. Ideally, national or regional entities would manage national level funds, further localizing resources and decision-making power. However, funding constraints and limited capacity or lack of suitable national or regional entities led to a global setup.

A meeting of sanitation workers and local officials, facilitated by Vizhuthugal under the ISW-supported program (Image: Vizhuthugal)

Work supported by the empowerment support fund has resulted in stronger mobilization and effective advocacy, especially in cases with dynamic leadership and connections with policymakers.

In Pakistan, the Centre for Law and Justice trained sanitation workers’ leaders, and as a result, the workers unionized, forming a national association of sewer cleaners. Their advocacy efforts also brought sanitation workers’ rights to public attention and into policymakers’ agendas, even reaching the regional Parliament.

In Tanzania, Watu Kazi was an informal group of pit emptiers that came together to build their skills and capacities to provide safe sanitation services. With grant support, they were able to engage with diverse local and national actors, thus inspiring similar action in other cities, as well as efforts to form a national association of pit emptiers.  

Similarly, interventions in India (Karnataka and Tamil Nadu), Burkina Faso and Bangladesh have also helped strengthen sanitation workers’ leadership and advocacy, and supported them to demand their rights and legal entitlements, such as compensation for workplace injuries and deaths.

As an innovative pilot, there was an element of risk and uncertainty. Due to operational challenges, the support provided to one organization had to be discontinued. A shared understanding between ISW and BMGF, that innovation and risk are two-sides of the same coin, helped navigate the situation.

The capacity and level of articulation of sanitation workers was lower than anticipated, which meant the fund was not always able to directly support sanitation workers’ groups (although in only two instances), and there had to be greater reliance on the engagement of grassroots organisations and the local NGOs that support them (in six instances). In hindsight, this should not have come as a surprise, given we were trying to engage with informal workers that often face systemic discrimination, and get very limited support and attention.

Overall, the consultative, iterative, and flexible nature of the pilot helped tailor the processes to diverse contexts and needs. This allowed both ISW and the sanitation workers’ organizations to learn as they went along, and effectively adapt to emerging challenges and priorities.

Sanitation workers interacting with civil society and policy stakeholders at a capacity building workshop organized by Center for Law & Justice, Pakistan (Image: Center for Law & Justice)

The ISW pilot demonstrates the value of investing in sanitation workers’ grassroots movements, and supporting them to drive change, sometimes achieving a disproportionate impact for limited funding in a short period of three years. In the context of limited assistance (and sometimes discrimination) by governments, mainstream unions, and wider society, there is a strong case for support from organisations in the sanitation, labour and human rights sector, as well as from donors and philanthropists. This is an issue of human rights and dignity, which is also crucial for achieving the ambitions of safely managed sanitation and the promotion of decent work. Strengthening the sanitation workforce is a crucial part of the systems’ strengthening agenda to accelerate sanitation progress.

Those willing to support sanitation workers’ group may take inspiration from this pilot. The approach needs to be participatory, flexible and adaptive, thereby allowing space for calculated risks and time for collaborative decision-making. Due to the complex and deep-rooted challenges of sanitation workers’ rights, long-term funding commitment is needed to bring about sustainable change. Funding needs to be accompanied by technical and networking support, wherever required.

All this is easier said than done, as it goes against conventional grant-making and aid accountability mechanisms. It will need a radical reimagining of ways of thinking and working, if it is to be applied at scale.

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This article is part of a series which highlights  learnings from sanitation workers’ mobilization and networking initiatives, supported by the Initiative for Sanitation Workers, across different countries. Read the other blogs here.

The blog was written by Kanika Singh, independent consultant, and Andrés Hueso González, WaterAid; with contributions from Prerana Somani, Initiative for Sanitation Workers; and Rajeev Munankami, SNV.