Water and Sanitation Coordination Forum

CHITRAL: Water & Sanitation Coordination Forum institutionalized at Chitral. Like other parts of the country Tehsil Municipal Administration (TMA) efforts to provide effective water and sanitation services to the people of Chitral being supplemented by several Non Government Organization, line agencies, and developmental projects. During a survey it was observed that due to lack of mutual coordination and exchange of information most of the valuable resources wasted in duplication. To control this repetition and to invest resources in a coordinated and integrated manner an effort has been made to established Water and Sanitation Coordination Forum at Chitral to enhance the capacity of various service providers for effective and efficient delivery of water and sanitation services. It was proposed that the forum is initially established an advisory and consultative body facilitating its members organization including the TMA to make informed decion for planning and implementing projects to municipal services.

The members organizations were requested to work voluntarily wit the forum. Membership of Forum is open for all NGOs, Developmental projects, Line Agencies and local Government. The forum members will be required to pay rupees 1000 as membership fee and rupees 100 monthly charity. The forum will call its routine meeting quarterly to discuss various issues like water and sanitation and potable drinking water. Main objectives of the WSCF are to achieve the goal of providing of potable drinking water and improve sanitation system in the town area. To enhance the capacity of various services providers for effective and efficient delivery of water and sanitation services to improve. To avoid duplication and make coordinated efforts for wise utilization of the available scarce resources and to engage community service providers, Govt, and donors for sustainable and responsive delivery of water and sanitation services in Chitral. One of the initial activities the Forum can undertake is to develop baseline of the existing municipal services and related issues in TMA Chitral. Need assessment can be done through study of the available secondary data and holding consultations with community members experienced individuals and organizations.

The Forum will planning on available information to enable the forum to carry out multi-year water and sanitation plans for Chitral. The planning documents to developed will be guide all stakeholders to define needs-based strategic for planning and executing projects for improving the state of water and sanitation in Chitral. While planning and executing projects the forum members need to coordinate regularly to avoid duplication of efforts and ensure wise utilization of their existing resources. All members’ organizations and stakeholders will share information for long term and sustainable planning for improvement of water and sanitation service in Chitral town. The proposed Water and Sanitation Coordination Forum is envisaged as a regulatory authority having the mandate to guide and allow various Govt. and Non-Govt. institutions to provide water and sanitation services in the jurisdiction of TMA Chitral.

While the Forum is a collection of Govt. and Non-Govt. organizations and projects they can build on each other experiences and technical expertise to provide a sound technical base to the from and its members. They can fulfill each other need internally without utilizing resources on hiring external resources. The Forum can fulfill its initial managements thorough sharing their financial technical, human and material resources. If the forum performs effectively, relevant donor agencies can be mobilized to invest for strengthening the forum. The required technical skills to be shared for capacity building of the Forum at large in case of non-availability of in-house resources then Forum members can pool heir financial resources to hire the required services from external market. Existing technical skills will be shared for capacity building in case of need of any out side expertise the forum members can pool their financial resources to hire the required services from external market. Engineer Sardar Ayub Regional Program Manager of Aga Khan Rural Support Program the Chair person of the WSCF and Sartaj Ahamd Khan Tehsil Nazim Chitral Secretary of the Forum thanked all members organizations and stake holders and stressed upon them to play their role for enhancement and improvement of water and sanitation service in Chitral.

G.H. Farooqi PO Box # 50 GPO Chitral Pakistan Phone +92 943 302295, 414418, 03025989602

Email: gulhamad@gmail.com, gulhamaad@yahoo.co.uk, gulhamad786@hotmail.com