Reinventing the Toilet carries great promise

The Bill and Belinda Gates Foundation’s new venture to “Reinvent the Toilet” will help address a disturbing sanitation challenge on the continent, something which Eastern Africans should particularly take note of.The WHO/UNICEF Joint Monitoring Programme (JMP) for Water Supply and Sanitation notes in a 2008 Conference Report that the proportion of the population using an improved sanitation facility throughout Africa was 38 per cent.Improved sanitation facilities include those that ensure hygienic separation of human waste from human contact. They include flush or pour-flush toilet, ventilated improved pit (VIP) latrine, pit latrine with a slab to step on and composting toilet.Just to clarify, sanitation facilities have been given a “four-step ladder” hierarchy in which JMP has categorised the condition and manner of use, or lack of it, of the facilities.Open defecation is categorised lowest in the ladder, followed by use of unimproved sanitation facilities, then shared sanitation facilities, and improved sanitation facilities at the top.Unimproved sanitation facilities are those that do not ensure hygienic separation of human excreta from human contact. These include pit latrines without a slab or platform to step on, hanging latrines and bucket latrines. (Hanging latrines are those you might find in human settlements whose dwellings are built on stilts over water).Shared sanitation facilities, even “of an otherwise acceptable type”, are those shared between two or more households. These include public toilets.The largest proportion of Africans using improved sanitation facilities is in Northern Africa, at 68 per cent, and lowest in Western Africa at 24 per cent.Open defecation is highest in Eastern Africa where 33 per cent of the population does not use any type of sanitation facility.By definition, this includes “going” in fields, forests, bushes, bodies of water or other open spaces, or disposal of human waste with other solid waste.That is the grim situation in the region. The JMP is, however, quick to point out that Eastern Africa saw a 25 per cent decline in open defecation since 1990, from 44 to 33 per cent.Eastern Africa region, as categorised by JMP, includes Burundi, Comoros, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Rwanda, Somalia, Uganda, United Republic of Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe.Taking the continental view, a 2011 Consultation Report on Post-2015 Monitoring of Drinking-Water and Sanitation notes that Africa is not on track to meet the MDG sanitation target. In order to meet the MDG sanitation target the current number of people in Africa with improved sanitation needs to more than double from 354 million in 2006 to 762 million in 2015.An urgent solution is therefore imperative. Note that poor sanitation affects health which affects economic productivity condemning many to a cycle of poverty.The Bill and Belinda Gates Foundation’s Reinvent the Toilet initiative is driven by what many on the continent already appreciate: that the solution is not in the modern flushable toilets, which need a complex sewer system and use too much water – already a scarce commodity.The Foundation has therefore offered grants to eight universities around the world to develop a toilet that operates without running water, electricity or a septic system.There are many promising ideas, some already proving workable. One such is “a toilet that transforms waste into biological charcoal, minerals, and clean water”. Another sends “black soldier fly larvae into latrines and even home toilets to process waste, resulting in high quality, environmentally friendly animal feed”.If these two ideas alone come to sustainable fruition they present a case of “hitting two birds with the same stone” and promise broad development ramifications in the region and Africa.Twitter: @gituram