Over 500 million people lack access to safe sanitation and 120 million plus people lack access to safe drinking water in India. In fact, the adverse economic impacts of inadequate sanitation were reported
to be as high as 6.4 percent of India’s Gross Domestic Product (WSP Economics of Sanitation Initiative 2010).
In such a scenario, it becomes critical to create awareness and encourage participation on these issues.
Research has proven that children can be the drivers of change within a community. Given the IT revolution in the country coupled with the ease of access to mobile phones by children, there might be a potential window of opportunity for the sector.
Create applications/tools for children so as to ensure that Water and Sanitation (WatSan) hygiene is instilled in them. This could be achieved through the provision of:
Games, puzzles, and so on,on WatSan emphasizing the ‘play & learn’ approach Free 2D and 3D animations/cartoon applications on WatSan, pre-loaded on mobile phones
Some otherways tocreate awareness on WatSan issues could be the availability of quick ‘Did You Knows’ or ‘Trivia of the Day’ for people, preferably in their local language, on mobile phones, for example, did
you know that open defecation in India is nearly 58 percent vis-à-vis the world percentage?
Owner: Shilpi Jain Water Aid <shilpij11@gmail.com>
The content for the application could be provided by the service provider to the end user either free of cost or on subscription.