November 17, 2010
World Toilet Day: Delving deeper than toilets

Toilets play a vital role in improving health and productivity in the world's poorest countries. WaterAid works with local partners to help communities find incentives to build their own low-cost toilets, and, crucially, to keep them in good working order.

We are constantly looking at ways to make our work more sustainable. For example, what happens with the waste that is deposited in the toilets we help to build?

This is a major challenge, especially in densely populated slums with no water or sanitation services, where diseases such as cholera and typhoid spread easily.

It is important to go beyond just providing health benefits. We also want to improve people’s livelihoods to help ensure the sustainability of our work
Erik Harvey, WaterAid's Technical Support Manager

In countries, such as Malawi, Mozambique, Tanzania and Uganda, WaterAid is helping people to dispose of their toilet waste and make money at the same time.

Tanzania – turning waste into business opportunities

In Temeke district in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania’s largest city, WaterAid is running a scheme whereby small-scale businesses take away people's toilet waste for a reasonable cost.

Although almost a million people live in Temeke and it is a legally recognised settlement, provision of basic services is very poor.

Nobody knows what to do when the latrines fill up. A common practice is to wait until the rains come, then empty the contents of the latrines out on to the streets and let the rains wash the sewage away. This obviously somewhat defeats the point of having the latrines in the first place, turning the streets into open sewers.

WaterAid is helping community-based organizations (CBOs) to obtain loans to buy a motorbike and sludge pump (gulper) which is the most effective way of emptying latrines in slum environments. Large trucks often cannot get through the small and winding streets and emptying toilets manually is obviously unhygienic. The CBO then pays pump operators and drivers to carry out the service.

Erik Harvey, Technical Support Manager at WaterAid says: “This is an ideal approach to help improve sanitation in the slums and prevent disease, but it also brings economic benefits to a community suffering high levels of unemployment.”

Mozambique – Using organic compost to increase crop yields

In more rural areas, WaterAid is supporting communities to transform toilet waste into compost for growing crops. In northern Mozambique, Estamos and other WaterAid partners build ecological sanitation (Eco-San) latrines. The latrines have two pits so that when one pit is full the contents are left to decompose and the second pit is used. When the second pit is full the first pit can be dug out as the waste products have transformed into rich compost.

The compost is harmless and odorless. After each toilet use ash is added to assist the composting process, reducing the smell and keeping flies away.

Omar Salima, a member of the local farmers co-operative, talks enthusiastically about how the compost has improved their harvest. “The compost produced has increased our yields and is producing better quality crops. Now, we not only have enough food for ourselves but we have extra crops to sell. In the past we had to buy artificial fertilizer and we could only afford to cultivate 3 hectares. Now we are able to farm 13 hectares.” With profits from the crops, villagers have bought clothes and school materials for their children and have built more latrines and wells.

The organic compost has environmental benefits too, as it retains water better and helps build the soil instead of depleting it of its texture, as artificial fertilizers do.

Nepal – converting toilet waste into fuel

With support from WaterAid and other partners, thousands of families are using domestic biogas plants to turn toilet waste into fuel and compost in Nepal. The fuel is used for cooking and lighting and the compost is used to help fertilize crops. WaterAid is also working with the Nepalese government to try and ensure that this project is scaled up to benefit as many people as possible.

On World Toilet Day, WaterAid is proud of reaching 9.4 million people with sanitation, but we are even prouder that our work goes beyond this.

Erik Harvey concludes: “It is important to go beyond just providing health benefits. We also want to improve people’s livelihoods to help ensure the sustainability of our work. In fact the two complement each other. Improved livelihoods lead to better water and sanitation facilities, which in turn leads to better health.”

ENDS

• For media inquiries about WaterAid's work please call Jonathan Rich on +1 347 262 9115 or contact him by email