Negros Or. officials commit Zero Open Defecation

DUMAGUETE CITY, Philippines – Officials of Negros Oriental, led by Governor Roel Degamo, yesterday signed a declaration of commitment to achieve a Zero Open Defecation to improve the health and living conditions of the province's constituents.

The signing was held at a local hotel in the city during the First Provincial Sanitation Summit, in cooperation with the Water and Sanitation Program of the World Bank.

It was noted during the summit that of the 271,185 households in Negros Oriental, only 76 percent have access to sanitary toilets. Furthermore, 24 percent or 325,420 persons (65,084 households) are still without access to sanitation.

Provincial Health Office chief Edgardo Barredo highlighted the need for sustained information and education campaigns down to the barangay levels against open defecation.

Barredo said it is imperative that local governments adopt strategies and legislation to help achieve such target, but the ZOD program is basically targeted at behavioral change of the people.

Local government, health, and sanitation officials have noted the practice of open defecation which they described as "customary" and "still a widespread phenomenon in coastal, midland and upland areas as well as in urban and peri-urban barangays."

The practice is common among the poor sector because of the "lack of means to survive on a daily basis", they noted.

Apart from being unsightly and bringing about repulsive odors, more serious concerns on open defecation include contaminated water sources, transmission of gastrointestinal infections, and even high malnutrition rates due to exposure to poor sanitary conditions.

"We see the need to effectively target barangays with the highest number of open defecation cases and trigger behavior change down to the household level towards Zero Open Defecation,"  the declaration of  commitment said.

Apart from commitment to advocacy, implementation and personal support to the project, those present during the summit also identified a list of measures to undertake in the coming months for better sanitation practices in the province.

These include the crafting of an inclusive sanitation policy agenda, specifically appropriate and timely ordinances, that address the issue of open defecation and poor access to improved sanitation.

Also, the signatories committed to develop local sanitation enterprise/sanitation marketing and the pursuit of a monitoring and evaluation mechanism to monitor the progress towards achieving ZOD in Negros Oriental.

Finally, they also committed further to accelerate effective sanitation interventions in the different cities and municipalities and allocate the necessary resources for program implementation.

Degamo said the provincial government will fully support the program and allocate a budget for advocacy and similar information dissemination campaigns, with the help of the local governments down to the barangay level.

The governor said LGUs can learn from and replicate the experience of Bindoy town in its existing implementation of a program against open defecation.

Bindoy town, headed by Mayor Valente Yap, had recently launched its ZOD campaign to educate residents against the hazards of the unsanitary practice of open defecation.

The Bindoy LGU says it is now ready to provide toilets to households, as well as undertaking education campaigns on open defecation as well as giving incentives to the barangays who will reach the ZOD target.

The towns of Bindoy and La Libertad in Negros Oriental are the pilot areas for the ZOD program, with a target of making open defecation-free by 2016.