Cooperation to improve access to education, water and sanitation

Linked by decentralised cooperation since 2022, the commune of Tori Bossito and the commune of Mana, in French Guiana, aim to develop water and sanitation in the Beninese commune. The two partners approached the NGO HAMAP-Humanitaire to design and monitor a project to improve access to school infrastructure in five schools in the commune. As well as meeting the significant need for sanitary facilities in the selected schools, the project will improve access to healthy food through a school canteen, as a pilot. In 2018 the Beninese government launched a school canteen support programme entrusted to the WFP. It provides food, but the schools of the commune of Tori Bossito lack the facilities to prepare meals and host pupils. The project therefore proposes building a canteen at the Satré school, along with a biodigester to process organic waste and supply the canteen with cooking gas.

These construction activities will be accompanied by awareness sessions for pupils in the five primary schools on water, hygiene and sanitation issues. The management committees for the sanitary facilities and the canteen will also be trained with the support of a local association.

In addition, the partner local authorities share challenges in accessing water in the most remote localities. Joint missions will put their technical services in touch and diagnose their needs for structural strengthening.