Akvo Foundation, a Netherlands based organization and the Government of Liberia have completed a three day workshop on data collection for actors in the Liberian Water, Sanitation and hygiene sector.

The workshop is part of an agreement with the Liberian government for Akvo Foundation to train both government, NGOs and Civil Society Organizations in data collection and information dissemination in the sector.

The refresher training took into consideration the two tools the government of Liberia currently used for data collection management and information dissemination.

The training which was divided into two phases, focused on training in Really Simple Reporting, RSR and Akvo Flow for data collection.

According to the coordinator of the National water Supply sanitation and hygiene Promotion Committee, Mr. Abdul Hafiz Koroma, the importance of such a workshop cannot be over emphasized because it plays a cardinal role in the sector.

Mr. Koroma said it was acknowledged in March this year at the end of the second Akvo Flow Workshop that there should be a roll out plan to find out how beneficiaries were using the tool for reporting data in the sector.

The NWSHPC coordinator disclosed that at the time there were no standardized World Surveys in the WASH Sector.

He said there was a compelling need to have surveys on Community led Total Sanitation, Water points and institutional latrines. He noted the idea behind all of these surveys are intended to ascertain whether data collected by NGOS were in line with the government.

Mr. Koroma said unfortunately government data collected in the sector was far different that of the Non Government organization implementing projects in the sector.

“All of these efforts and progress is aimed at sustaining the achievements made in the WASH sector in Liberia” he added.

Mr. Koroma further said the training in Akvo Flow is primarily for NGOS that are presently implementing projects with main objective of improving WASH data collection.

He said immediately after the training sending data from the field manually or on sheets will be abolished to encourage reporting on a web based platform.

He however said Argo Flow training will also be extended to districts and counties for NGOs and Government staff to be capacitated in web based reporting.

“At the end of the workshop, we hope to achieve one of the most critical needs in the sector which is the management of WASH Data he asserted”.

He described one of the water points as protected wells with hand pumps and not basically water quality.

Mr. Koroma informed reporters that some staff from the Ministry would also be sent to Amsterdam for further training in Akvo Flow with the purpose of building the capacity of others in the sector.

The workshop was facilitated by staff of Akvo Foundation from the Netherlands.