Professional Summary: Dr. Kamal Kar is a globally known prolific social entrepreneur who has taken the challenge of ending open defecation head on in South Asia, Africa and Latin America.
Dr. Kar (fondly known as Kamal Da), a specialist in livestock production, agriculture and natural resources pioneered the Community-Led Total Sanitation(CLTS) approach in Bangladesh in1999-2000. The CLTS methodology which is based on a no-subsidy policy and rooted in a model of community empowerment and mobilisation, has radically transformed global sanitation policy focus from toilet construction to the process of collective behaviour change. It has spread to more than 69 countries across Asia, Africa and Latin America where more than 40 million people are now living in open defecation free (ODF) environments. CLTS has also been mainstreamed in the sanitation policies of more than 25 countries in these regions.
Over the last 15 years, Kar has played an instrumental role in the spread of CLTS globally by providing capacity building, policy advice and process support to national governments and international agencies like, WSP, DFID, UNICEF, WSSCC, Irish Aid, WHO, Plan international, Water Aid, CARE and many more. After introducing the approach in Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, Cambodia, Pakistan and a few other countries in Asia, Kar introduced the approach in the countries in Eastern and Southern Africa from 2006, which included Uganda, Ethiopia, Tanzania, Kenya, Zambia, Mozambique, Malawi, Eritrea and Sudan, Ghana, Madagascar. He took the approach to West Africa in 2007 by facilitating major training workshops in Sierra Leone, Mali, Nigeria and Chad in 2009.
The Handbook and the Trainers’ Guide on CLTS written by Dr. Kar has been translated in to more than ten different languages. Additionally, he has authored several practice papers on CLTS. The prestigious Foreign Policy Magazine of Washington DC selected Dr. Kar amongst the Top Hundred Global Thinkers of the World in 2010. The Asian Development Bank declared Dr. Kar as the Water Champion of 2011. Dr. Kar is the recipient of Sarphati Sanitation Lifetime Achievement Award 2015 given by World Waternet, Netherlands Water Partnership at Amsterdam last year, which is a recognition of the immense work he has done in the sanitation sector spanning many continents, countries and communities.