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An interdisciplinary Swiss community of practice bringing together a wide range of specialists to promote wider and deeper understanding of key issues in water supply, sanitation and hygiene in developing countries.

The AGUASAN group, based in Switzerland, is one of the oldest existing sector specific communities of practice on the Swiss development scene. Founding members belong to several Swiss development and development research organisations, including the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC), Water and Sanitation in Developing Countries (SANDEC), Helvetas and the Skat Foundation. Since 1984 AGUASAN has regularly brought together water and sanitation experts from around the world in 3-monthly meetings to discuss current trends and innovations in the field of water supply and environmental sanitation.

Above the regular meetings, AGUASAN also holds annual summer workshops in Switzerland, bringing together project field staff, desk officers, researchers, experts and consultants for a week of exchange and reflection on selected development issues. AGUASAN workshops are clearly intended to foster a mutual learning experience, particularly making participants with a technical background more aware of non-technical aspects of water and sanitation development. Besides this major goal, the workshops also aim to utilise the broad and multi-faceted knowledge and experience available within the group, by developing and examining strategies and conceptual tools that will be of practical use in development cooperation.

Recent AGUASAN workshop topics include caring & integrated management, private sector participation, household-centred approach, opportunities & challenges in a decentralised context and the impact of personal paradigms. The workshop 2010 dealt with the topic of "Large Scaling-Up”, answering how to effectively influence large water sector investments so that they contribute to the scaling up of successful piloted service delivery models and established good practices. The June 2011 workshop addressed the implications and actions needed to put the human right to water and sanitation (HRTWS) into practice resulting in a compilation of tools and good practice examples for HRTWS implementation at the different steps of the WASH project cycle. In its most recent edition, the AGUASAN workshop 2014 tackled the question of "How to bridge the water, food and energy sector divides for increased benefits and resilience in watersheds?"

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