Happy World Toilet Day!

 

Happy World Toilet Day!

This year, the theme of the annual World Toilet Day was ‘sustainable solutions and climate change’, which is becoming increasingly necessary to pay attention to, given the pressing concerns that the global climate crisis imposes. With frequent flooding episodes and drought periods, sanitation systems are under threat (ibid) and in order for communities to remain resilient to the risks of climate change, they must adapt to more sustainable approaches. But before exploring how existing systems can be improved, a closer examination of the current systems is needed, which  Naafs (2020) excellently summarises in Figure 1. The diagram identifies what points within the sanitation service chain are vulnerable to climate change: 

 

Of the four interactions that Naafs highlights, the ‘need for resource recovery’ at the end of the sanitation chain is particularly interesting to explore in the context of Africa, given the diverse sanitation practices and facilities used.

Sewer systems and solid waste management is heavily neglected in informal urban settings, as the municipal governments have no incentive to intervene and provide infrastructures given the unregulated and unrecognised status of informal settlements such as Kibera, Nairobi. Whether there are community facilities available such as unlined pit latrines, or the practice of open defection or ‘flying toilets’, the reality is that the waste is poorly managed, if at all, and is often times dumped at sites that are deemed convenient- “out of sight, out of mind”. As a result, not only is the exposed faecal matter and the harmful bacteria within entering and polluting water systems- by leaking into groundwater or intercepting in open drains, but the absence of management also complies with false dichotomy that separates ‘sanitation’ and the ‘environment’. This linear system is inherently unsustainable and counter-productive, as the useful nutrients and energy in the human excreta is wasted.

In resource scarce settings such as urban slums, there is a dire need to transition to circular systems that embrace resource recovery, as encouraged within climate change discourses as well. An Ecological Sanitation (EcoSan) framework exemplifies a promising sustainable solution that reframes the Western notion of “human excreta waste suitable only for disposal” (Langergrabera and Muelleggera, 2004), and instead views it as a resource, that feeds into a circular flowing network. The EcoSan toilet, piloted in Cape Town, is a waterless facility that had revolutionised previous systems that were entirely reliant of a strong water supply. The significance of this is that it has relieved demand pressures on water stressed areas, and the human waste is collected and converted into compostable material which can boost agricultural productivity and enhance sustainable community development. These provisions also provides a dignified saniation space for the community (pictured below) , whch is often a drastic improvement from their previous facilities and thus, enhances their livelihoods and sanitation.

EcoSan Toilet in Cape Town

However, despite the array of environmental and economic benefits of EcoSan and its potential role in improving sanitation, there is evidence of limited acceptance of the technology across East Africa. In Ethiopia, for example, contact with human faeces is unacceptable and using human excreta as a soil conditioner is a new concept, which highlights some of the several limitations to EcoSan technologies which need to be considered immediately in order to help communities transition to more circular systems of sanitation. With appropriate design and planning measures for local cultures, as well as improving user education, more success can be yielded from EcoSan projects.

Capturing the value from what traditionally is viewed as “waste” not only has economic incentives, but can build long-term resilience to the devastating impacts of climate change that local communities cannot escape. It’s interesting to see that EcoSan technologies have existed for years, but much of the literature does not explicitly situate this sustainable solution within broader climate change discourses and the potential that these systems have in building resilience. Rather, much of the focus has been on the role that EcoSan has in community development, illustrated by numerous case studies that have achieved economic prosperity. Yet, this year’s World Toilet Day theme has hopefully reiterated and emphasised the link between the two, and called for a closer appreciation of the two.