The National Rural Water Supply, Sanitation and Irrigation Program (Ru-WatSP) is one of the six closely interlinked National Development Programs of Ministry of Rural Rehabilitation and Development (MRRD) in Afghanistan.
The national Ru-WatSP as one of the national development programs was established in 2003 with the aim of:
► Provide rural communities with sustainable clean drinking water, sanitation facilities, hygiene promotion and community awareness for operation and maintenance of the services
► Standardize and harmonize designs, technical specifications, and guidelines
► Lead coordination among stakeholders for effective planning, investment and Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) through having a comprehensive web-based MIS/GIS system
► Develop, implement and monitor policy and strategies for the sector as required
► Provide capacity building for the civil servants (water and sanitation departments)at national and provincial level.
► Completion of 863 projects in all 34 provinces of Afghanistan in 2003
► Formulation of Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) Policy in 2004
► Completion of 328 projects in 22 provinces of Afghanistan covering a total of 78 districts in 2005
► Nimroz 2nd phase of the drinking water project has been started in year 2005 through which , 60,000 people will get access to clean drinking water.
► Completion of the Implementation Manual for WASH Policy in late 2006, through which an interactive process has been developed to work with various organizations who associated with Water and Sanitation Group (WSG)
► Revision of Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) Policy in 2nd quarter of 2007
► Establishment of WASH cluster in 2008 with 21 partners
► Completion of 224 projects in 21 provinces in different districts in 2009
► Revision of Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) Policy in January 2010 for the third time.The revised version of WASH Policy includes the commitment of the Government of Islamic Republic of Afghanistan to improve the quality of life of people in the rural areas of the country
► Establishment of Water Quality Control Laboratory in Ru-WatSP in July 2011
► Construction of 250 km Pipeline Project in Nimroz province in April 2012 which is funded through Ministry of Finance (MoF)
► Participation of senior staff of MRRD and Ru-WatSP in October 2013 in the 5th South Asian Conference on Sanitation (SACOSAN) held in Nepal for 2nd time.
► Signing of Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between MRRD and Swedish Committee for Afghanistan (SCA) for implementation of Rural Water Supply, Sanitation and Hygiene projects for 2014-2017 in January, 2014
► Launching of Ru-WatSP’s GIS/MIS program in February 2014
► Attending of Senior Staff of Ru-WatSP/MRRD at Inter-Country Working Group Meeting (ICWG) in Dhaka in January 2015
►Conducting of Solar Pump Workshop in 3rd quarter of 2015 at MRRD
► Celebration of Global Hand-Washing Day (GHWD) in October 2015 at MRRD conference room
► Revision of WASH policy in last quarter of 2015
► Celebration of World Toilet Day (WTD) in November 2015 at MRRD
►Participation of Afghan delegation in Sixth SACOSAN held in Dhaka, Bangladesh in January 2016
►Conducting of 1st WASH Cluster Coordination Meeting at MRRD in January 2016
