Water for Women (WfW) Fund is an investment by the Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade that is supporting a number of civil society organizations (CSOs) to implement 19 WASH projects in 16 countries throughout South Asia, Southeast Asia, and the Pacific over five years starting in late 2017.
Plan Indonesia and Plan International Australia (PIA) are working in partnership to deliver the only Water for Women (WfW) project in Indonesia. The WfW Fund places gender equality and social inclusion (GESI) at its core focus including the Fund’s goal: “Improved health, gender equality and well-being of Asia and Pacific communities through inclusive, sustainable WASH”. This project seeks to create transformative GESI changes at the practical as well as the strategic levels (i.e., those that change power dynamics between women and men). It stretches Plan Indonesia and PIA greatly with new and brave approaches, and deepens existing successful strategies.
Working across Kabupaten Manggarai and Kabupaten Sumbawa Barat, this project directly contributes to the Fund’s Outcomes. In rural areas, Plan Indonesia will work in partnership with local CSOs to catalyse change towards GESI responsive WASH, giving increased attention to intersecting work including with community-based total sanitation (STBM) program teams at district to village levels—particularly PKK (National Women’s Organization) and Posyandu (integrated health posts/cadres), and others (e.g., entrepreneurs and schools).
The primary objectives of the research is to deepen the understanding of the current context with relation to GESI.
This GESI Formative Research will focus on collecting evidence to develop a deep understanding on current extent, underlying/core reasons, barriers, and opportunities—in the household and local public domains, and lightly on the broader public domain—in both project districts. In addition, this research will also explore the impact of climate change on the daily life of the community, especially on water availability and water needs, and its relevance to GESI.
To be able to provide in-depth understanding of the current extent, underlying/core reasons, barriers, and opportunities, this research adopts qualitative and participatory approach in data collection and analysis. Data will be collected through in-depth interviews and focus group discussions at the household, community, village, subdistrict (kecamatan), and district (kabupaten) levels. The focus of this research will be at the household and community domain, and only lightly at the broader public domain.
This research is conducted in Kabupaten Sumbawa Barat (West Nusa Tenggara) and Kabupaten Manggarai (East Nusa Tenggara). Three villages—located in three kecamatan—in each kabupaten are selected as the study locations. The selection is based on, among other factors, the presence of previous WASH project, the location of Plan’s project, as well as socioeconomic and geographical conditions.
