WSP
Total Sanitation and Sanitation Marketing Project:Indonesia Country Update June 2009

Sanitation Transformation in Rural East Java
Traditional approaches to improve sanitation, which are aimed at building toilets and other facilities, have not resulted in significant and sustained sanitation coverage in Indonesia, particularly in rural areas.

In recent years, a shift towards focusing on behavioral change has shown promise, and results at scale are beginning to emerge: Since November 2007, more than 325,000 people have gained access to improved sanitation facilities in 21 districts across East Java; communities have financed these facilities exclusively with their own resources, leveraging some Rp.2-30 million over Rp.1 million project expenditure; 715 communities were declared open defecation free; and local government funding for rural sanitation has increased by 68% on average over the 2007 baseline.

A partnership between the Government of Indonesia, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and the Water and Sanitation Program-East Asia and Pacific, the Total Sanitation and Sanitation Marketing project aims to generate sanitation demand and increase the supply of sanitation products and services at scale. While the community-led total sanitation approach to initiate behavioral change to move communities towards becoming open defecation free is fairly well known and used in Indonesia by now, merging this with a sanitation marketing component that reinforces demand creation based on qualitative and quantitative surveys, while also strengthening the local availability of sanitation products and services is new territory and is generating a lot of national and international interest.

This Field Note is an update on project progress. It outlines current achievements, but also seeks to identify what needs to be done in order to scale up beyond East Java to improve rural sanitation country-wide.