Impact brief preparation and TSU process documentation

Water For People India (WFP India) was established in 2008, and designs and implements ground-level solutions that help the marginalized communities in rural areas and urban slums – access their share of water resources. WFP works on the Everyone Forever model to ensure their efforts are ultimately directed towards uplifting the most vulnerable and water-deprived communities for generations to come. WFP India also supports state governments (e.g., West Bengal, Bihar) as a support agency through the Technical Support Unit (TSU) model, which helps scale WFP’s proven practices while bringing innovations to address current WASH challenges through government machinery.

WFP India onboarded Samavit a research and knowledge-building partner to capture WFP’s successful pilot of the TSU model in West Bengal and Bihar and measure the impact of WFP’s overall interventions in 2023. The major objectives of this engagement were:

• To prepare a comprehensive impact brief and factsheet to capture the impact of WFP’s overall interventions in Maharashtra, Bihar, and West Bengal.
• To support WFP in documenting processes of the TSU model to enable efficient replication in other geographies.

To document the processes of the TSU model, Samavit conducted an initial consultation with the WFP team to identify the activities of the TSU model. Following that, Samavit conducted in-depth interviews (IDIs) with TSU staff and relevant government stakeholders. Samavit captured “as-is” processes, identified inefficiencies, and documented “should-be” processes. To prepare the impact brief, Samavit utilized annual monitoring datasets managed by WFP India’s MEL team. Samavit’s team cleaned the datasets and used techniques like temporal analysis, frequency tables, and cross-tabulation to prepare detailed charts and narratives for the impact brief. The team also conducted rapid desk-based research to establish the convergence of WFP India’s work with national priorities and schemes.

Samavit prepared a comprehensive process guide to capture each process in the TSU model. This process guide included names of processes, staff involved, timelines, step-by-step activities (as-is), issues and challenges, step-by-step activities (should-be), documents and files required, and risk-mitigation strategies. Samavit prepared a detailed impact brief unpacking the impact of WFP’s interventions on household water, household sanitation, household hygiene community water points, and public institutions (healthcare centers and anganwadi centers). To summarize the findings of the impact brief, Samavit also prepared a factsheet.