A financially viable and safe solution for managing human waste

Collecting small monthly payments will help waste collectors build their business.

Pit latrine workers in Bangladesh collecting and transporting human waste to a site where it is processed into fertiliser. Image: Neil Palmer (IWMI). Credit: University of Leeds

Spreading the cost of emptying pit latrines over a series of monthly payments could make it more affordable for poor households and help kick start the safe reuse of faecal sludge as fertiliser and biogas. This is the conclusion of a willingness-to-pay study carried out in a rural sub-district of Bangladesh covered by the BRAC WASH Programme II.

The study has already caught the attention of policymakers, and influenced the development of Bangladesh’s first regulatory framework for faecal sludge management. Some of the authors are members of the Bangladesh National Committee for Fecal Sludge Management.

Currently, households struggle to pay a lump sum of US$13 every three to four years to empty their pit latrines. This is approximately 14% of their monthly income. Instead, the study found they could pay small monthly payments of as little as US$ 0.31 per month, comparable to what they spend each month on a mobile phone service. These up-front payments help waste collectors to invest in the development of their service. Nevertheless, a government subsidy would still be needed to cover the full cost of safe removal and transport of faecal sludge.

As mentioned above, there is potential for waste collectors to generate extra revenue by converting faecal waste into fertiliser and biogas. The profitability of these waste by-products, however, can be effected by existing subsidies for chemical fertilisers and conventional fuels. Another factor that can reduce profitability is the low energy or calorific value of human waste compared to other organic wastes. A companion study carried out as part of the BRAC WASH Programme II tested solutions to increase the calorific value by co-processing human waste with other agricultural wastes.

The willingness-to-pay study is an output of the Value at the end of the Sanitation Value Chain (VeSV) research project, lead by the University of Leeds. VeSV was one of six action research projects funded by the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands (Bangladesh) through IRC. Additional funding was provided by the CGIAR Research Program on Water, Land and Ecosystems.

For more information read “Spreading the cost to transform sanitation“, published by the University of Leed’s School of Civil Engineering, 22 March 2017.

Citation: Balasubramanya S, et al. (2017) Towards sustainable sanitation management : establishing the costs and willingness to pay for emptying and transporting sludge in rural districts with high rates of access to latrines. PLoS ONE 12(3): e0171735. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0171735

This news item was originally published on the IRC website, 27 March 2017.

Sanitation giant Dr. Babar Kabir dies

Babar Kabir. Photo: BRAC

The former senior director of BRAC’s disaster management and climate change (DMCC) and water  sanitation and hygiene (WASH) programmes, Dr Babar Kabir, died on 15 January 2015.  Under his leadership more than 37 million people in Bangladesh were provided with hygienic sanitation and another two million with access to safe water through the BRAC WASH Programme.

IRC has been a knowledge partner of BRAC WASH since 2006. Thanks to Dr. Kabir, BRAC supported IRC’s contributions to Sanitation Updates from 2012-2015.

Bangladesh has lost a passionate man in Dr Babar Kabir, former director WASH @BRACworld https://t.co/rBHjpedwRN

— Ingeborg Krukkert (@ikrukkert) January 16, 2016

In 2013, Dr. Kabir gave this short video interview about the BRAC WASH programme for WaterCouchTV.

In 2014, Dr. Kabir left BRAC. He recently became Bangladesh Country Director for Water.org

Dr. Babar Kabir, a giant. We are bereft with the news of his passing and in awe of his immense contributions to WASH and our community.

— Claire Lyons (@PPPAdvisory) January 15, 2016

Babar Kabir is survived by his wife and two daughters.

For more information read the obituaries on the websites of BRAC and IRC.

A toilet for 66 million people in rural Bangladesh

BRAC staff member on a household visit

In Bangladesh, the largest NGO in the world BRAC is working its way up to help the country to get proper sanitation. It has reached more than half of the population since the start 9 years ago. It is one of the world’s largest sanitation implementation programmes. IRC works with BRAC to make it happen. In this interview, IRC sanitation expert Ingeborg Krukkert tells her story about her work in Bangladesh. ”

Bangladesh is well on track to meet the Sustainable Development Goals in 2030,” says Ingeborg Krukkert in IRC’s headquarters in The Hague. “This is undeniably due to BRAC because it’s serving half of the country. Bangladesh is a good example for others on how to achieve so much in such a short time. It is proof that change is possible.”

IRC’s Sanitation and hygiene specialist for Asia, Ingeborg Krukkert, travels to Bangladesh every two months to work with BRAC. Working on hygiene promotion and behavior change, she complements BRAC’s groundbreaking programme with IRC’s monitoring system to measure and enhance the true impact in sanitation and hygiene.

#MenstruationMatters in Bangladeshi schools

28 May is Menstrual Hygiene Day. In Bangladesh, BRAC field staff are working hard to “end the hesitation around menstruation” especially in schools.

BRAC staff member (left) from Jessore district with sanitary napkins for schools. Photo: Petra Brussee/IRC

Field staff of BRAC WASH in Bangladesh talk just as easily about menstrual hygiene as they do about water seals for toilets or hand pumps. At community level menstrual hygiene messages are included in the programme for adolescent girls and young women. Since 2006 about 45 million community cluster meetings have been organised.

In rural areas rags are used by women who cannot afford sanitary napkins. Field staff discuss menstrual hygiene with adolescent girls and young women, for example on how to wash rags with soap and dry them in the sun. They are also encouraged to speak up about menstrual hygiene says Abu Taleb Biswas of BRAC WASH in Hygiene Promotion – the backbone of BRAC WASH: “Women and adolescent girls learn to speak up about menstrual hygiene issues, something that was nearly unthinkable even a few years ago.”

BRAC enters sanitation Hall of Fame

At the 14th World Toilet Summit 2015, BRAC received the “Hall of Fame Award” for significant contributions to the sanitation sector in Bangladesh.

On 20 January, BRAC received the “Hall of Fame Award” for significant contributions to the sanitation sector in Bangladesh. The award was handed to Dr. Akramul Islam at the 14th World Toilet Summit 2015 in Delhi by Dr. Subramanian Swamy MP, Former Minister of India, and Jack Sim Founder of the World Toilet Organization in the presence of Minister Devendra Chaudhry, Special Secretary, Ministry of Power India.

Bangladesh has made remarkable progress in providing basic sanitation services to its people. It is now estimated that throughout Bangladesh, 57% use sanitary latrines, while a mere 3% of the people still practise open defecation.

Over 8 years, the BRAC WASH programme reached more than 66 million people, about half of the rural population of Bangladesh. It has successfully worked to improve household sanitation by creating demand for hygienic latrines while supporting an extensive supply chain and local businesses. Current coverage with hygienic and adequately maintained toilets is 82% in the 152 districts where BRAC has worked. All these successes have been underpinned by a strong provision of service to the poor and ultra-poor and by a unique hygiene promotion programme focusing on universal use and sustainability of services in communities, households and schools.

IRC is a knowledge partner of BRAC WASH since 2005.

Read more at: http://www.ircwash.org/news/brac-enters-sanitation-hall-fame

India launches national monitoring of toilet use

How does India’s new large-scale sanitation monitoring effort compare with similar initiatives in Bangladesh and Indonesia?

Image: Government of India (GoI)

According to some media the Indian government has unleashed “toilet police” or “toilet gestapo” into the country [1]. In fact, the central government has instructed local officials to take photographs of new toilets to prove that they have not only been constructed but are also being used. If states don’t upload photos by February 2015, the water and sanitation ministry has threatened to withhold funding from a new national sanitation programme [2].

Yes, hygiene and school enrolment are directly proportional

In Bangladesh, the lack of separate latrines for girls and menstrual hygiene facilities in secondary schools are major factors in the disproportionate rate of absence and dropout of adolescent girls.

 Sabrina Shahidullah

A study undertaken in Bangladesh revealed an 11 per cent increase in girls’ enrolment mainly due to the provision of sanitary toilets.” –Technical paper series/IRC

In Bangladesh the standard number of toilets in schools has been set as a minimum of one toilet for every 60 students. However, this is far from being achieved. The infographic below shows that on average, schools in Bangladesh have half the number of toilets required. However, although 94 per cent of schools have latrines within the compound, a large number remain unusable because they are dirty or broken.

Source: UNICEF WASH for school children South Asia Report, 2012

BRAC WASH releases video on faecal sludge management

The BRAC WASH programme has released a short video about their ongoing study in Bangladesh on the use  of faecal sludge from double pit latrines as organic fertiliser.

The final evaluation of BRAC WASH I programme identified pit emptying and the safe final disposal of sludge as a key ‘second generation’ challenge for the near future. To address this, BRAC is undertaking action research to ensure the safe reuse of faecal sludge in the BRAC WASH II programme, answering the following questions:

• Does the faecal sludge comply with the WHO Guidelines on microbiological quality after one year of storage?
• What is the nutrient content of the faecal sludge?
• Is it possible to make faecal sludge-based organic fertiliser production commercially viable?

In 2013, the UK-based School of Civil Engineering at the University of Leeds won a BRAC WASH II research call for secondary treatment options for faecal sludge. Their project is called Value at the end of the Sanitation Value-chain (VeSV).

The University of Leeds is working together with three other partners: Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET), NGO Forum for Public Health (Bangladesh), and IWMI International Water Management Institute (Sri Lanka).

More information:

• IRC – Introducing the VeSV project
• BRAC WASH Programme – Innovation and Learning

 

 

 

BRAC WASH latrines will power business to turn faecal waste into energy

The BRAC WASH programme in Bangladesh is to conduct detailed planning to convert faecal matter from pit latrines into commercially viable fertiliser, biogas and electricity. The aim is to complete the sanitation chain by making material from millions of pit latrines safe and economically productive.

Babar Kabir, Senior Director of the BRAC WASH programme, says that there is a sound business case for investment in bio-energy units that could generate electricity on a large scale, but believes that investors must be in this for the long-term and that the most important payback will be improved health and sanitation.

Research call for commercially viable processing of pit latrine contents

IRC International Water and Sanitation Centre announces a research call for: Commercially viable processing of pit latrine contents: using a mix of human faeces, chicken manure and silage material.

This call is part of the BRAC WASH II programme in which EUR 1.5 million will be used for innovative research, tendered to consortia of leading European and Bangladeshi research organisations.

The planned duration of the research project will be 12 months. The anticipated cost of the project is EUR 325,000.

Guidelines for research call

Application form

Send full proposal application forms to bracactionresearch@irc.nl by 30 August 2013