Importance of country Examples

The above examples of country experiences highlight three important factors.

1. They serve as models for understanding key components and levels of sanitation policy. As documents the policy statements are quite comprehensive and thorough in coverage of the various dimensions to the sanitation issue. As governments and advisors look to support the development of sanitation policy the developments in Uganda, Nepal, India and particularly South Africa stand out as key references for policy content.
2. Policies are seen to be an important motivating force for focused programme planning on sanitation. Policy sets the stage and provides incentives. Too often sanitation is not singled out, or is lost behind water supply programming initiatives. The sanitation policy statements as seen in South Africa, Uganda and Nepal are effective in placing a spotlight on sanitation and mobilising resources for addressing service shortfalls.
3. The presented country examples help to illustrate the complexity of policy implementation, and the many stages and facets of policy change. Enacting a sound policy, while an important step, is not sufficient. Results will be realised with full implementation. As part of decentralisation, sanitation is being devolved to local governments. This transition un-bundles the roles of policy-makers by level of government, creating challenges to sustain national-level momentum by working through varying levels of capacity at the sub-national levels. Each country case reinforces the fact that success depends on implementation, and implementation is a slow and challenging process. In fact, the major difficulty in all cited cases is how to get the policy implemented at the lowest level of government. Therefore, large countries need to have general national policies with increasingly more specific policies for lower level political sub-divisions such as provincial, county, municipal, village or community.