Exp Social Marketing Zambia was engaged by UNICEF Zambia to develop and implement the SOPO and

WAKILINI handwashing with Soap campaign in Zambia. The brief required Exp Social Marketing Zambia to design

and implement the campaign.

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The Campaign Deliverables

1. Activate 240 schools in 19 districts with a headcount of 72,000 pupils reached.

2. Encourage pupils to use finger puppets to communicate messages of good behaviour change.

3. Demonstrate how to build and use a tippy tap.

4. Activate 19 communities through market activations and community forums.

5. Run radio programs to amplify the message of hand washing.

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The Strategy

School Activation: The team was tasked to visit 240 schools, in 19 districts across the country. Using mascots,

hand washing heroes, finger puppets, wall murals and tippy taps, team members educated the various pupils on

the importance of hand washing with soap/ash.

WAKILINI Community Forums& Market Activations: Through the use of popular/industrial theatre, the team

was tasked to educate communities on the importance of washing hands with soap regularly alongside avoiding

open defecation.

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Execution

Preproduction: This was done at two levels as indicated below;

• Make contact with Ministry of General Education and Ministry of Chiefs and Traditional Affairs to get necessary approvals at national level.

• Make contact with the schools and select champion teachers that where the point of contact for the activation team.

• Opinion leaders were engaged through courtesy calls and opinion leader's workshops.

  • At the workshop, teachers and community leaders were informed of what was expected to happen during the activations.

  • The final route plan was drawn up at this point and communicated to both the client and the activation team.

  • The final route plan included the activation points in order of execution, the contact numbers for the champions, village headmen and head teachers.

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School Activations: The first point of contact with the pupils was in the classroom. The team used finger puppets

and hand washing heroes to disseminate the message of hand washing with soap. Thereafter, pupils were

assembled at the assembly point where they were entertained by the SOPO mascot, taught how to make tippy

taps and shown best hand washing practices. A wall mural was later presented to the school to act as a trigger for

hand washing with soap.

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Community Activations: The community activations were in two parts, namely community forums and market

day activations. The major communication points included:

·The Clear Bucket Demonstration: Demonstrating the importance of washing hands with soap and under

running water.

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The Egg Game: Hands may look clean but can be dirty as we cannot tell with the naked eye if hands are dirty.

 

Group Hand Washing for schools: Make it a habit to wash hands with soap every time.

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Tippy Tap: Presence of hand washing station triggers the practice of hand washing.

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Always Wash with soap or ash: Dirt can only come off your hands after washing with soap.

Use soap or ash. Ash has the same germ-killing agents as soap.

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Media Activation: The 'SOPO and Friends' call in radio program was aired through community radio stations

in local languages to amplify the hand washing with soap message. Public service announcements were also

aired at prime times to create awareness of the campaign in the areas where the campaign was being

implemented, as well as those that were not reached.

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What were the challenges that Exp had to overcome to ensure success?

• The examinations period: Most of the schools had grade 7 and grade 9 examinations. This meant that some of the classes were out of school.

• The community forum venues were situated around the chief's palaces which in some instances were far from some local communities that were activated.

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Achievements

• A total of 19 opinion leader workshops against a target of 19 were conducted with a total attendance of 384 opinion leaders engaged.

• A total of 65, 848 pupils were reached against a target of 72, 000.

• A total of 6,743 persons were reached during the 19 market day activations.

• A total of 6 community forums were conducted in phase 1 with a total reach of 2, 199 people while 12 forums were conducted with a total of 2,337 people.

• Over 4 million people were reached using public service announcements, adverts and radio soap opera through various community radio stations.