Our impact
Since 1985, we have been working in Ghana with the Government and its allied agencies on a mission to transform lives with WASH services, through six overarching programme strategies. With our supporters and partners, we have directly reached 1,258,936 people in Ghana with clean water, 496,237 with decent toilets and 3,779,558 with hygiene services. Through large-scale hygiene promotion, as part of our COVID-19 response we reached more than 9 million people in Ghana with hygiene promotional messages.
With direct funding from, among others, Global Affairs Canada, the UK Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office, United States Agency for International Development, Australian Aid, the European Union, Zochonis Charitable Trust, Hemsley Charitable Trust, HSBC Bank, the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Diageo, we have made a huge impact on Ghana’s WASH sector, both at national and sub-national levels.
Improving healthcare with WASH
At Mirigu Health Centre, where Felecia (pictured) is a midwife, we installed clean water, baths, toilets and an area for hygienic waste disposal. Women can now wash after giving birth and there is enough water for washing hands and cleaning equipment.
Our aims
We will deliver our new Country Programme Strategy for 2023–2028 on the basis of past experience, in partnership with communities, civil society organisations, research institutions, private sector partners and the Government and its allied agencies. To ensure we have the biggest possible impact and influence others to act, our focus over the next five years will be to, by 2028:
1. Achieve universal, sustainable and safe access to WASH services in Bongo District that will influence wider change across the country. We will use evidence from the outcomes of this aim for influencing and to advocate replication of our work in other areas and, eventually, for everyone, everywhere in Ghana.
2. Prioritise inclusive WASH services and hygiene behaviour change across the health sector to improve public health. Our work in the health sector has put us in a position to have even greater influence. Focusing on this aim will enable us to continue advocating health sector leadership on WASH in health.
3. Strengthen the resilience of WASH services to climate change. We will focus on improving the resilience of communities and services in the Upper East and Upper West Regions to the effects of climate change, informing wider replication.
Healthcare without WASH
Katiu Health Centre has no clean water, so staff and patients wash and clean with dirty water from a borehole nearby, walking to a school for drinking water. "We cannot provide quality care as a result of the poor facilities," – midwife Faustina Sedjoah.
Explore our strategy
Our approach
Our new country programme strategy is characterised by scale, sustainability and strategic partnerships. We will particularly emphasise supporting local institutions to achieve their WASH ambitions and will be effective, dynamic and sustainable catalysts for change for these institutions and the communities they serve.
Our approaches fall into six categories:
- Service delivery and capacity strengthening
- Evidence, learning and innovation
- Advocacy and influencing
- Strategic partnerships and alliance building
- Gender equality and gender-responsive WASH
- Peace and security