UVP - Latrine Coverage and Sanitation
Uganda Village Project (UVP) is working to increase latrine coverage and sanitation in communities in Iganga District, Uganda. This initiative is one element of UVP’s five-year “Healthy Villages” program, which seeks to bring a basic healthcare package to 70 of Iganga’s most under-served villages.

Lack of sanitation, most especially household latrines, is one of the leading causes of disease in Uganda. Unsanitary compounds can lead to an increased risk of malaria or eye disease such as trachoma, while lack of latrines and other unsafe water practices lead to waterborne diseases such as typhoid and chronic diarrhea. Waterborne diseases are particularly fatal to children in Uganda – seventeen percent of all deaths for children under five are caused by diarrheal diseases, while eight percent of all total deaths are caused by diarrheal diseases (WHO). Funded.

Through Grass-roots Organizing and Community Participation
We work with our volunteer Village Health Teams (VHT), who know the sanitation and latrine status of every household in their village. Village Health Team members not only act as model citizens by constructing their own best-quality latrines, but also conduct house-to-house visitations, encouraging their neighbors to construct and improve latrines, and to adopt better sanitation members. The VHT may also hold community outreaches on the subject, working on their own or partnering with other organizations.

Partnering with Government
We work with our Sub-County officials, the Health Assistant and the Community Development Officer. These officials meet with our Village Health Teams, hold community outreaches on increasing latrine coverage, and may even conduct house-to-house latrine checks or fine houses without latrines, if the VHT thinks this to be a suitable measure.

Behavioral Change through Drama
While grassroots pressure and government mandates may convince families to construct or improve latrines, only a genuine change in values will ensure that latrines are used, and cared for over the long term. This is why we begin each village’s Sanitation and Latrine Campaign with a visiting drama group performance, stressing the diseases and problems associated with poor sanitation and lack of latrines, and encouraging villagers – through story – to change their own behavior.

Incentivizing Action
We integrate our Sanitation and Latrine Campaign with our Shallow Well Program, by helping villages who increase their latrine coverage considerably to construct their second shallow well. (Our five current Healthy Villages already possess one UVP well, and so we use the second well as their incentive. For future villages, we shall work to increase latrine coverage before construction of even the first shallow well.)