UNICEF: Promoting safe sanitation practices in Bangladesh

HATITILA, Bangladesh, 31 July 2008 -- At the community development centre in Hatitila, a remote village in the Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh, Athoi Marma, 19, teaches songs about safe hygiene practices to 20 pre-school children. The songs are in Marma, an indigenous language spoken by only around 150,000 people in Bangladesh.

Athoi is one of 25 women from this hard-to-reach region who have received training from UNICEF to work as community hygiene promoters. The 15-day training seminar equipped her with tips on how to work with the community to promote safer hygiene practices.

Now, Athoi has become an agent of change for her village.

"We used to drink stream water and utilize unsafe water for cooking," she explains. "If we had known that unsafe water was harmful for our health -- that this was causing diarrhoea and respiratory disease -- we would not be drinking it."

To read the full story, visit: http://www.unicef.org/infobycountry/bangladesh_44854.html

Category:

Nonprofits & Activism

Tags:

• UNICEF
• Bangladesh
• sanitation
• Hatitila
• hygiene
• water
• children

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