World Toilet Day tackles global sanitation

On November 19, the world celebrates World Toilet Day – a day officially recognised by the United Nations to promote awareness and inspire the world to tackle the global sanitation crisis.

This year’s theme for World Toilet Day is “Toilets and Jobs”.

This article aims to highlight the link between job creation and toilets with specific focus on South African and sub-Saharan initiatives led by the Water Research Commission (WRC).

The WRC’s research manager responsible for sanitation, Dr Sudhir Pillay, said, “The toilet. Defaecation, faeces and urine. It is not the most popular conversation to have.

“And certainly not the one you have around the dinner table – unless you work with poo – like I do.

“Yet, toilets and ‘going’ to the toilet is important from a health and environmental perspective.

“When open defecation occurs – going to the toilet in the open – there can be a spread of diseases such as cholera and diarrhoea.

“This link was established as early as the 1800s, when John Snow, a physician, linked the Broad Street cholera outbreak in London to contaminated water supply from a pump which was close to a leaking cesspit containing faeces.

“A similar outbreak of cholera in KwaZulu-Natal in the early 2000s highlighted the importance of having clean drinking water, better hygiene practices and, yes, the availability of well-maintained toilets.”

The main purpose of the toilet is to provide a barrier to disease and pollution.

Despite the importance of sanitation, the developing world still struggles with providing sanitation in comparison to other basic services.

It is little wonder then that sanitation is called the “Cinderella” of basic services – it’s more hidden and less well-known than drinking water supply – yet equally as important.

In 2012, the WHO/UNICEF reported that there were 644 million people in sub-Saharan Africa, that is 70 per cent of the population, using an unimproved toilet facility or having to resort to open defecation.

“For this reason, World Toilet Day is celebrated across the world – it’s not only to break the taboo about toilets and poop, but also to raise awareness of the challenges facing the developing world.

“This year’s theme for World Toilet Day is “toilets and jobs”.

“You may ask yourself what jobs are there for toilets; surely it must be caretaking services and plumbing, both of which are critical to maintaining community health through the maintenance and provision of clean facilities.

“There are other jobs linked to sanitation with businesses centred around providing sanitation services across the value chain, from providing new toilets to converting faecal waste into beneficiated products, like charcoal substitutes, which potentially hold a monetary value,” said Pillay.

An example is:

In 2009, the WRC launched a project that saw the piloting of the concept of social franchising for water and sanitation delivery, specifically for schools in the Eastern Cape.

With funding support from Irish Aid and in partnership with the Eastern Cape Department of Education (DoE), the franchise-like partnership model was demonstrated at 400 schools and 250 households in the Eastern Cape.

Amanz’abantu Services (Pty) Ltd, a provider based in East London with a well-established track record and appropriate expertise, set up a subsidiary, Impilo Yabantu Services (Pty), to be a franchisor, and microenterprises, established from the community in which they are based, were trained to be franchisees and were required to operate under the same band as the franchisor.

The pilot enabled the services rendered by the local franchisee to be of a specific standard, enabled franchisees to have easy access to highly-trained and experienced personnel as part of the franchise deal, and protected the franchisees from delays in cash flow and payments.

Through the pilot, 400 schools were serviced and more than 20 sustainable jobs and more than 50 part-time informal employment opportunities have been created.

This pilot clearly showed the relationship between job creation and service delivery through an innovative public-private partnership.

As there are so many people in the world requiring sanitation services, there will always be an opportunity for job creation linked to sanitation services.