The Upper West Regional Environmental Health and Sanitation Department has declared seven hundred and seventy-nine communities Open Defecation-Free (ODF) zones in the region.
In an interview with the Monitoring and Evaluation Coordinator, Alhassan Inusah Agambire, he noted that the figure represents sixty-six percent of communities enrilled in the fight against open defecation in the region under the Community-led Total Sanitation program (CLTS).
He added that the CLTS is the government of Ghana initiative set up in 2010 to address rural sanitation challenges and to achieve open defecation-free in rural communities.
Inusah Agambire stated that the Nadowli/Kaleo, Daffiama/Bussie/Issa and Jirapa Districts are targeted to achieve a district wide open defecation-free status in 2021.
He explained that the Department is expecting to declare more communities open defecation-free and to achieve a target above seventy percent.
He noted that, the Nandom Municipality is the only district that has been declared district wide open defecation-free in the entire West Africa since the year 2019, a performance he described as extraordinary.
He related the extraordinary performance to the by-laws on sanitation by the Nandom Municipal Assembly.
On the way forward, Agambire noted that the Environment Health and Sanitation Department will carry out more advocacy programs on various media platforms and also strengthen their relationships with stakeholders and partners to achieve open defecation-free in the entire region.
Agambire said that, Wa Municipal, Wa East and Sissala West Districts are the worst performing zones in the fight against open defecation.
However, he stared that Nandom, Jirapa and Nadowli/Kaleo Districts are leading the chart in combating open defecation in the region.
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