The national workshop on equitable access to water and sanitation served to review and discuss the experiences gained in the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia related to equitable access to water and sanitation.

During the workshop, the national steering committee studied the process of how the assessments of the situation of equitable access to water and sanitation in the municipalities of Skopje, Kumanovo and Veles had informed the development of Local Equitable Access Action Plans and drew lessons for the possible development of a national Equitable Access Action Plan.

The workshop also contributed to a national reflexion towards accession to the Protocol on Water and Health. It provided information on it benefits, its areas of work and experiences with ratification from other countries.

The work on equitable access to water and sanitation in the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia was organized as a two-phases project.

In the first phase of the project (2015-2016), the Equitable Access Score Card, a self-assessment tool that was developed under the Protocol on Water and Health, had been applied in the municipalities of Skopje, Kumanovo and Veles. In the project’s second phase (2017), on the basis of the findings of the assessments, local action plans to address the challenges in ensuring equitable access to water and sanitation had been developed by local steering committees. Subsequently, a national steering committee had been formed.