From Adam Talsma, People's Action for Clean Hands (PANCH), Agra
Posted 12 November 2010
I work for People's Action for Clean Hands (PANCH) in Agra, Uttar Pradesh. We are working on a pilot hand washing project funded by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, USA.
PANCH (temporary website available at http://web.mit.edu/panch/index.html) has designed a training programme and a set of low-cost technologies to facilitate slum-dwelling women’s Self Help Groups (SHGs) to design, produce and sell their own hand washing solutions. The year-long pilot will be launched in December 2010 in partnership with the local NGO, Shri Nirotilal Buddha Sansthan (SNBS).
PANCH is focusing on using hand washing design as a way of giving local people the space, tools, time, and financial support needed to develop their own solutions for their own reality. The end of the pilot will be an awards ceremony in which the most promising hand washing solutions developed will be awarded support to start their own small businesses around their products.
PANCH is looking to establish communication with NGOs that have done or are currently doing projects focused solely on hand washing in India. We are seeking to learn from past hand washing projects in India. In this regard we seek members’ contributions on:
- Are there any examples of SHGs which are involved in designing, producing and selling their own home-grown hand washing solutions?
- Are there any case studies documenting these processes?
- What is the methodology for assessing the impact of hand washing on health and other factors?
Your inputs will be very useful to us for carrying out this programme.
Please see attachment below for the responses.