Mr. Verhagen is a Senior Water and Sanitation Specialist in the Water Global Practice of the World Bank. Joep has worked in the Water and Sanitation sector for the last 20 years with a particular interest in rural sanitation. Following on a ten-year stint as an independent consultant in India, Joep joined the International Rescue Committee (IRC) in 2005. Within IRC, he increasingly focused on support for large-scale rural sanitation programmes and worked on a range of issues such as adaptive management, monitoring, productive use of faecal sludge, sanitation marketing, social mobilization and social marketing. Joep was also leading a capacity development programme for senior officials of the Government of India. In addition, he was the project director of the IRC-lead technical assistance project to the BRAC WASH II programme. The BRAC WASH II programme seeks to provide sustainable sanitation services to 55 million people and has a budget of approximately US$ 100 million. Joep also oversaw a range of sanitation programmes in South and South-East Asia and he is part of the IRC’s management team.