The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), in collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Water Resources and UNICEF, will this Sunday, November 24, flag off a WASH – NORM Survey in Nigeria to collect latest information on improved water access, the percentage of Nigerians who are involved in open defecation, and general sanitation practices.
The WASH is an acronym for Water, Sanitation and Hygiene while NORM is National Outcome Routine Mapping.
According to a statement issued by the Statistician General of the Federation, Dr. Yemi Kale, on the three-week long exercise, the survey will provide further context on previously published data on water access, sanitation, and open defecation.
In 2013, the NDHS Report showed that 34% and 59.6% of Nigeria’s population had access to improved sanitation and improved water sources respectively. The report also indicated that 28.7% of Nigerians still engaged in open defecation.
The NBS noted that these incidences posed a significant risk to public health and well-being, thereby requiring that more information is needed to gain further insight into this challenge to develop appropriate and better-informed solutions
The agency stated that it is for this reason that the WASH–NORM Survey was being conducted to provide quality data to the Nigerian Government to enable evidence based decision making as well as the efficient application of resources towards the improvement of access to WASH services in the country.
By its scope, the survey will cover all the 36 states of the federation, including the FCT, and 40 enumeration areas will be selected for study in each of the states and FCT.
However, in Lagos and Kano, the Bureau stated that 40 enumeration areas would be selected based on each of the senatorial zones.
It added that the enumerators would be in the field to collect data from respondents for three weeks, beginning from 24th November to 15th of December this year, and appealed to respondents to give the enumerators the required information for a successful conduct of the survey.
