Honduras: Poverty and Sanitation

Poverty and Sanitation: An Analysis of the Linkage between Poverty and Basic Sanitation in Honduras, Water Sanitation Program, 2008.

This document presents an analysis of poverty levels mong rural and urban households of Honduras and their access to sanitation solutions. It identifies key spects for improving services and contributing to ector policies, strategies and investment plans that arget the poor. The analysis is based on a broad eview of available documentation and data.

This study shows that the low income population in Honduras is mainly rural (74%) and that the rest resides in urban areas (26%). The highest levels of access to sanitation services in cities corresponds to household connections to piped sewerage networks, but this option mainly serves the non-poor. Only 31% f the moderately poor and 12% in extreme poverty in urban areas have achieved access to sewerage networks.

Link to the report (pdf)

Menstrual hygiene and the need for women friendly toilets

Most sanitation programmes are silent about women and adolescent girls’ need to clean and change menstrual towels and menstrual management tends to be ignored in latrine design and construction and excluded from hygiene education packages. Even reproductive health and preventive health programmes in developing countries often do not address this sensitive issue. A recent article in Source Bulletin describes how WaterAid has tackled this issue in Bangladesh.

One of the first studies to highlight the lack of attention in the water sector given to menstrual hygiene was written by
Sowmyaa Bharadwaj and Archana Patkar from Junction Social consultants, Mumbai, India, in November 2004, called “Menstrual Management in Developing Countries: Taking Stock”. They gave a presentation on this topic at the Water, Sanitation and Hygiene for Schools Roundtable meeting, which took place in Oxford, UK, 24-26 January 2005.

In Africa, one of the activities of the QUEST programme (1998-2006) involved research in Kenya, Zimbabwe and Uganda on the links between life skills, sexual maturation and school sanitation. One of aspects looked at was how poor menstrual management negatively affected girls school attendance. Unfortunately the research reports from this study are not available online.

The latest issue of Source Weekly elaborates on an earlier posting in this blog about the problems women in Kampala, Uganda, face due to the lack of proper places for disposal of used sanitary pads. The Source article also gives a link to a report published last year, called “Menstrual hygiene: a neglected condition for the achievement of several Millennium Development Goals”. The report was the outcome of a “Stakeholder Meeting on Menstrual Hygiene for Girls and Women in Developing Countries”, held on 28 November in The Hague, The Netherlands.

China - ‘Toilet-to-tap’ coming to China, professor says

WASHINGTON DC — In 2010 China will embrace “toilet-to-tap” water treatment technology, predicts Xia Siqing, an environmental science professor at Tongji University in Shanghai and former visiting professor at Arizona State University, according to a Feb 20 story on Environmental Science Technology Online News.

Professor Xia is experimenting and testing “toilet-to-tap” purification techniques with a small-scale 105-gallons-per-day (400-liter) treatment plant housed in the university’s College Environmental Science and Engineering lab building.

Although Xia insists the reclaimed water is pure enough to be used for kidney dialysis, washing carbon-chips, and replenishing drinking-water supplies, according to the article, the water is actually reserved for use in laboratory experiments and local irrigation.

A second demonstration project of Xia‘s “toilet-to-tap” purification system is scheduled for the Shanghai World Expo to be held in 2010.

Read More - Water Tech Online

ASKNet - The African Sanitation Knowledge Network launched

ASKNet was officially launched on 19 February 2008 at AfricaSan 2008 in Durban, South Africa.

ASKNet’s mission is to: “enhance the ability of academics and professionals across the disciplines to contribute to the mainstreaming and up-scaling of sustainable sanitation in Sub-Saharan Africa, to the benefit of livelihoods, health, and the environment”.

The members of ASKNet’s temporary board are:

• Dr Nicola Rodda, University of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa
• Dr Kouassi Dongo, University of Cocody, Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire
• Mr Charles Niwagaba, Makerere University, Kampala, Uganda

UNESCO-IHE and ASKNet have submitted a proposal to the Netherlands Directorate-General for International Cooperation (DGIS) for the development of an internet-based Master Program on Sustainable Sanitation.

ASKNet is planning a Networking Conference n Maputo, Mozambique in December 2008 to mark the end of the 2008 International Year of Sanitation.

Sanitation paper shortlisted for Lancet Paper of the Year

A paper reporting on two cohort studies which looked at the effect of a city-wide sanitation programme on rates of childhood diarrhoea in northeast Brazil has been shortlisted for the Lancet Paper of the Year Award 2007.

The paper, from a team including DCVBU’s Professor Sandy Cairncross and colleagues from the Federal University of Bahia in Brazil, reveals how diarrhoea prevalence in children under 3 in the areas studied fell by more than a fifth following a drive to improve sewerage coverage from 26% of households to 80%. The findings show how important urban sanitation is as a health measure and provide timely support for the launch of the 2008 International Year of Sanitation.

The paper was highlighted in Science magazine on 8 February, and the team who produced it were personally congratulated by the Brazilian Minister of Health, Jose Gomes Temporao.

The Lancet award will go to the paper that, in the view of the International Advisory Board, has made the greatest potential contribution to clinical research in the past year.

Medical Research News - Feb 18, 2007

Safe and sustainable livelihoods in agricultural communities: Optimizing the recycling of human waste

A seminar was held at IFAD Headquarters in Rome Tuesday 29 January 2008 with participants from IFAD and The Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI).

The main objective of this learning event was to share knowledge and experiences on the best ways of optimizing human waste or nutrient recycling, using productive sanitation systems. The event also highlighted the economic benefits of recycling nutrients as fertilizer in terms of improved soil condition, reclaimed water, increased agricultural productivity, employment generation, and health improvements and the reduction of environmental and public health costs.

The following presentations are available:

* The role of productive sanitation in global environmental sustainability
* Key linkages between agriculture and sanitation
* The MDG Sanitation challenges. Examples of productive sanitation projects in various regions
* Best practices optimizing nutrient recycling. Examples of ongoing projects
* A global pro-poor policy and capacity development programme on sustainable sanitation

Follow up:

The President of IFAD has declared his interest in investigating further opportunities for collaboration with institutions researching the role of productive sanitation in adaptation to adverse climate change effects.

A concept note will be developed linking climate change adaptation, productive sanitation systems and water management at the small-scale farmer level.

Current IFAD pilot initiatives related to productive sanitation systems will continue to be scaled up based on potential results. Several Country Programme Managers at IFAD have already shown an interest in testing those approaches in current projects (in Rwanda, Burundi, China, India and Swaziland and South Africa for example).

IFAD will also support different activities on productive sanitation systems during the International Year of Sanitation with partners such as the Sustainable Sanitation Alliance, SEI, UN agencies ( UNICEF) and private foundation.

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Gates Foundation backs €9.86 million reality check for water and sanitation costs by IRC

What does it really cost to extend and sustain safe water and hygienic sanitation to poor communities in developing countries? The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is supporting the IRC’s project, WASHCost: Quantifying the cost of delivering safe water, sanitation and hygiene services, with a US$14.48 million (Euro 9.86 million) grant over five years to answer this question and to transform information, learning and performance in the sector.

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Emergencies: global review of water and sanitation in refugee camps

23 Jan 2008, Source Weekly

The first global overview of basic water and sanitation indicators in refugee camps is presented (using data from 2003–2006) and compared with selected health and nutrition indicators. This demonstrates that average levels of water and sanitation provision are acceptable at camp level, but many refugee operations are suffering from gaps that cross-cut these sectors; e.g. typically poor sanitation provision is corresponding with low per capita availability of water.

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