Addressing Gender, Disability, and Environment in WASH Emergencies

Disasters disrupt daily life, but some groups face disproportionately severe consequences. In emergency settings involving water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH), women managing menstruation, persons with disabilities, and the natural environment often bear the greatest burdens. Addressing these cross-cutting issues is essential for effective, equitable, and sustainable humanitarian response.

Menstrual hygiene management in crises 🔗

At the end of 2024, roughly 60 million displaced women and girls worldwide struggle to manage their menstruation safely and with dignity. In humanitarian contexts, they frequently encounter inadequate access to private WASH facilities, culturally appropriate menstrual materials, and basic hygiene information. This gap represents more than inconvenience-it threatens health, safety, and psychological wellbeing.

Key challenges faced by women and girls 🔗

Systematic reviews reveal that during humanitarian crises, limited availability of menstrual products and poor access to WASH services become significant barriers. Emergency shelters often lack privacy, functional doors, adequate lighting, and gender-separated facilities. In some low-income settings, women have resorted to using old clothes, newspapers, or other makeshift materials because proper supplies were unavailable. Cultural taboos surrounding menstruation can further restrict movement and behaviours, preventing women from attending distribution points, markets, or schools.

The International Rescue Committee notes that privacy remains especially scarce in emergencies. Even when toilets exist, they often lack locks, functioning doors, lighting, and separation between genders-all essential for safe menstrual management.

Dignity-focused solutions 🔗

Effective interventions require a multi-sectoral approach. Research from Tanzania’s refugee camps demonstrated that toolkits covering needs assessment, materials distribution, sanitation facilities, and waste disposal can significantly improve outcomes when implemented with proper training.

Key strategies for dignity-focused menstrual hygiene management include:

Provision of complete hygiene kits: These should include not just absorbent materials but also supportive items like underwear, soap, and storage containers. UN Women has distributed dignity kits in quarantine sites during COVID-19, demonstrating scalable models.

Female-friendly toilet design: Facilities must incorporate privacy, internal locks, adequate lighting, water access for washing, and disposal mechanisms. Studies show that kerosene lamps in Uganda’s refugee camps made women feel safer when accessing latrines at night.

Private washing and drying spaces: Women using reusable materials need discrete areas to wash, dry, and store their supplies-a need often overlooked in emergency planning.

Accessibility for people with disabilities 🔗

Approximately one billion persons with disabilities globally face significant barriers to accessing WASH services. These barriers often remain unidentified because monitoring processes are not designed to collect disability data, making this population invisible in humanitarian response planning.

Common barriers in emergency settings 🔗

During disaster response, persons with disabilities are frequently excluded from emergency support and essential services including food distribution, medical care, shelter, and WASH facilities. The International Disability Alliance emphasises that persons with disabilities face additional barriers during conflict, displacement, and disasters-situations where rapid response often prioritises standard designs over accessible ones.

According to emergency WASH guidance, particularly in rapid response phases where time and resources are limited, traditional designs inevitably exclude people from otherwise well-intentioned facilities. Physical barriers at water points and latrines prevent independent use by wheelchair users, while lack of visual or auditory cues excludes those with sensory impairments.

Inclusive design principles 🔗

UNICEF’s guidance on disability-inclusive WASH recommends a twin-track approach combining mainstream interventions with targeted support. This means making general facilities accessible while also providing specialised assistance where needed.

Accessible infrastructure: Ramps at water collection points, handrails in latrines, and wider doorways accommodate mobility device users. Clear signage in multiple formats-visual, tactile, and audio-ensures persons with sensory impairments can navigate facilities independently.

Communication accessibility: Hygiene promotion sessions should incorporate sign language interpretation, pictorial guides, and simplified messaging. Materials must be produced in accessible formats including Braille and large print.

Meaningful participation: Water for Women emphasises that meaningful participation of persons with disabilities in planning and decision-making ensures interventions are appropriate. Partnerships with disabled people’s organisations (DPOs) help identify needs that might otherwise be overlooked.

Cost considerations: Research indicates that physical accessibility typically requires only 0.5-1% additional budget when considered during design, while assistive devices may need 3-4% more. These modest investments yield significant returns in equitable service delivery.

Environmental sustainability in WASH 🔗

Humanitarian WASH interventions, while essential for saving lives, can generate significant environmental impacts through resource consumption and waste production. Integrating environmental sustainability into emergency response protects ecosystems while building long-term community resilience.

Waste management challenges 🔗

Solid waste management is critical in humanitarian settings where existing collection and disposal systems are often disrupted. Unmanaged waste attracts disease-carrying vectors like flies and rodents, blocks drainage channels causing flooding, and pollutes water sources when burned or improperly disposed.

Oxfam’s WASH guidance notes that burning waste-particularly plastics-produces toxic fumes harmful to humans, especially children. Instead, humanitarian actors should establish organised collection systems, designate proper disposal sites, and separate hazardous materials from general waste streams.

The Global WASH Cluster recognises that solid waste remains one of the most under-addressed aspects of humanitarian response despite its importance for preventing disease transmission and protecting environmental health.

Rainwater harvesting for resilience 🔗

Rainwater harvesting offers multiple benefits for emergency preparedness and response. According to the World Bank, these systems can store water for emergencies such as earthquakes, serve as adaptation strategies during droughts, and reduce flood impacts by capturing urban runoff.

Research confirms that rainwater harvesting is applicable for both critical emergency situations and normal operations. The technique helps communities reduce dependence on potentially contaminated or overburdened water sources while recharging groundwater levels during rainfall periods.

Key benefits of integrating rainwater harvesting into WASH programming include reduced pressure on public water supplies, decreased groundwater extraction, emergency water reserves for firefighting or drinking, and extended soil moisture supporting food security.

Sustainable wastewater practices 🔗

UNHCR guidelines recommend that beyond emergency response, services should upgrade to include safe treatment and disposal of wastewater. In arid zones and where culturally appropriate, treated water may be reused in sub-surface irrigation systems for household gardening, contributing to food security while protecting water resources.

Oxfam has committed to a “do no harm” approach across humanitarian work, recognising that developing countries already hardest hit by climate change will face exponentially increasing humanitarian needs. This requires measuring greenhouse gas emissions from WASH operations and systematically avoiding negative environmental impacts.

Integrating cross-cutting considerations 🔗

Effective WASH programming requires recognising how gender, disability, and environmental concerns intersect. Women with disabilities face compounded barriers when managing menstruation. Environmental degradation disproportionately affects marginalised communities with fewer resources to adapt. Climate-resilient WASH infrastructure must be accessible to all users.

Humanitarian responders increasingly recognise that addressing these cross-cutting issues from the outset produces better outcomes than retrofitting solutions later. Environmental sustainability assessments recommend integrating rainwater harvesting, wetland restoration, and ecosystem services into WASH project planning from the start.

The path forward requires systematic data collection disaggregated by sex, age, and disability status; consultation with affected communities including women and persons with disabilities; environmental impact assessments for all interventions; and flexible programming that adapts to local contexts and needs.

What do you think? How can humanitarian organisations better balance the urgency of emergency response with the need for inclusive, sustainable programming? What role should affected communities play in designing WASH interventions that meet their specific needs?

References

1. https://www.publichealth.columbia.edu/research/programs/gate/our-work/menstruation-emergencies
2. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9555566/
3. https://www.rescue.org/resource/menstrual-hygiene-management-mhm-emergencies-toolkit
4. https://jhumanitarianaction.springeropen.com/articles/10.1186/s41018-018-0034-7
5. https://www.unicef.org/topics/disability-rights
6. https://www.alnap.org/help-library/inclusive-post-disaster-reconstruction-building-back-safe-and-accessible-for-all
7. https://www.internationaldisabilityalliance.org/DisabilityInclusiveWASH
8. https://www.emergency-wash.org/water/en/x-cutting-issues/xcuttingissue/inclusive-and-equitable-design
9. https://www.unicef.org/media/126126/file/Wash-and-disability-guidance-note-final.pdf
10. https://www.waterforwomenfund.org/en/learning-and-resources/disability-inclusion-and-wash.aspx
11. https://sanihub.info/topic/wash-solid-waste-management/
12. https://www.oxfamwash.org/en/sanitation/solid-waste
13. https://www.emergency-wash.org/solid-waste-management/en
14. https://blogs.worldbank.org/en/water/roofs-rain-and-life-rainwater-harvesting-safe-water-supply-and-sustainable-co-benefits
15. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3948194/
16. https://emergency.unhcr.org/emergency-assistance/water-sanitation-and-hygiene/wash-emergencies
17. https://www.oxfamwash.org/en/communities/environment
18. https://akvopedia.org/wiki/Water_Portal_/_Rainwater_Harvesting_/_WASH_Environmental_Sustainability_Assessment