Nepal: separate toilets for schoolgirls – a justified investment?

Nepal may be justifying a US$ 15 million investment in separate school toilets for girls for the wrong reasons suggests an IRIN news article.

The government says separate toilet would:

reduce the number of girls missing classes or dropping out because of the lack of private changing facilities during menstrual cycles – despite a recent study suggesting menstruation has very little to do with why girls attend school less regularly than boys.

While improved school sanitation may improve health, Emily Oster, one of the principal authors of a study in Nepal of the impact of menstruation on school attendance said:

“As far as we know, there is no quantitative evidence of the impact of separate toilets on girl’s schooling… what we can say based on our paper is that menstruation has only a very tiny impact on schooling for girls.”

This view was supported by Bed Prasad Kaju, headmaster of Sanjewani Model High School, a state school in Dhulikhel Municipality, 20km north of Kathmandu:

“The girl students have bigger problems than menstruation affecting their studies or class attendance, like helping their parents in household chores”. […] He said his school did not have enough toilets but more than 50 percent of his 1,100 students were girls. They attended regularly and their achievements matched those of the boys, he added.

Most of Nepal’s 28,000 state secondary schools lack girls’ toilets and in the few that do have them at least 250 girls are forced to use one latrine, said education specialist Helen Sherpa from international NGO World Education.

The new government scheme plans to install separate girls’ toilets in 5,500 secondary schools by the end of 2011, and in all secondary schools by 2014-15, said Khagaraj Baral, director of planning at the Department of Education.

Related web site: WASH in Schools

Source: IRIN, 18 Ma 2011

Nepal: Govt. to construct girl-friendly toilets in 5500 schools

The government is all set to construct girl-friendly toilets in 5500 community schools throughout the country to enroll more girl students in the schools. The government has allocated Rs. 1.1 billion [US$ 15 million] for the purpose. According to Department of Education, the drop out rate of girl students has increased due to lack of girl-friendly toilet in schools.

The school enrollment rate of girl students is 87 percent in primary level and 84 percent in secondary level. However, the drop out rate is 7 percent in primary level and 11 percent in secondary level (class 10).

“Various researches and studies have shown that dearth of girl friendly toilet in school premises is one of the reasons for girl students’ dropping out of schools. Therefore, the government has given priority to toilet construction in schools,” the Department of Education states.

“Menstruating girl students often remain absent due to lack of separate toilets for them,” said Gita Kharel, Principal, Ratna Rajya School Baneshwor, adding, “The government is doing a good job of constructing girl-friendly toilets this year.” “There is need of such toilets in the districts outside the Kathmandu Valley,” she added.

Deputy Director and chief of Gender Equity Section at Department of Education Ganesh Prasad Poudel told that the government is allocating Rs. 200,000 [US$ 2,730) to each community school for constructing a toilet. “In the absence of separate toilets for girls and boys, many girl students do not attend school regularly. Therefore, the government has given priority to construction of girl-friendly toilet,” said Poudel, adding, “We will construct necessary infrastructures so that girl students can change their sanitary pads during their menstruation period and maintain personal hygiene.” There are 32,000 community schools throughout the country.

Related web site: WASH in Schools

Source: Kantipur / NGO Forum, 31 Jan 2011

USAID Nepal projects to improve water & sanitation in schools

Feb 7, 2011 – Kathmandu, Nepal: USAID recently began two new projects directly with two local Nepali organizations to improve access to water, sanitation, and hygiene for more than 65,000 people in Nepal’s mid- and far-western region, a US Embassy press release said Monday.

The first project – School-Led Safe Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Improvement project – (SWASTHA) will benefit approximately 45,000 people in the mid-west. The second – Safe Practices on Water, Sanitation and Hygiene project (Safe-WASH) – will improve access to safe drinking water and sanitation facility and provide training on environmental sanitation, personal hygiene, irrigation and kitchen gardening to 27,000 rural people in the far-west, according to the release.

WSSCC’s Global Sanitation Fund programme in Nepal seeks sub-grantees

UN-Habitat, the Executing Agency for the Water Supply and Sanitation Collaborative Council’s (WSSCC) Global Sanitation Fund (GSF) programme in Nepal, is now seeking expressions of interest for potential sub-grantees to carry out GSF work on the ground in the country.

UN-Habitat will implement the hygiene and sanitation programme in five districts: Arghakhanchi, Bajura, Bardiya, Sindhupalchowk and Sunsari, and in the municipalities of Dharan, Gularia, Inaruwa, Itahari and Tikapur.

Sub-grantees can be Non Governmental Organizations (NGOs), Community Based Organizations (CBOs), private firms and local government bodies.

Deadline: 28 January 2011

For more details read the full Call for Expression of Interest (EOI)

Related web site: WSSCC – Global Sanitation Fund

Please do not send EOIs or requests for information to Sanitation Updates

Nepal: local NGO collecting urine of Maoist leaders

Unified CPN (Maoist) leaders at the inauguration ceremony of their party meeting in Palungtar, Gorkha, on 21 Nov. 2010. Photo: Ramkrishna Sharma / Nepalnews.com

A local Nepal is collecting the urine of over 6,000 cadres and leaders attending the sixth extended meeting of the Unified Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) in Palungtar, Gorkha. The intention is to convert the urine into fertiliser, said SEWA Nepal coordinator Srirendra Pokhrel.

The Extended Meeting Housing and Construction Sub Committee has constructed more than 200 toilets, costing Rs 500 (US$ 7.10) each for the meeting, which started on 21 November 21, 2010. Each toilet has a plastic pan and there are 300 funnels and jerrycans to collect urine.

In July 2010 SEWA-Nepal hit the headlines with its “Take a Pee & Get One Rupee” initiative in Chitwan.

Related web site: RCNN – Nepal Node for Sustainable Sanitation (NNSS)

Source: Bhimlal Shrestha, Nepal Samacharpatra / NGO Forum, 16 Nov 2010

Making Struvite from Urine in Nepal – 3rd Place Award Winner in Sanitation Video Contest

In Nepal, Shame Tactics Boost Bathroom Usage

While Pakistan is struggling with devastating flood waters, neighboring Nepal is fighting a water problem of its own: Contamination by human feces. Open defecation is so widespread in Nepal that health groups are making it a priority to change how and where people relieve themselves.

But when you have to go, you have to go. And for many people in Nepal, that often means outdoors.

“They feel that to do the open defecation in the open space or in the open air, they feel it is very much comfortable for them in the rural parts of the country,” said Roshah Raj Shrestha, who works with the U.N. Habitat in Kathmandu.

Nearly 60 percent of people in Nepal do not have toilets at home, according to Shresta. That means about 16 million people are defecating in the open.

Nepal: Naming and shaming open defecation offenders

SIDDHIPUR, 23 August 2010 (IRIN) – In the fight against disease and child mortality, Nepal has been using some unusual tactics to get people to stop defecating in the open.

Children blow whistles at offenders and post name-and-shame flags in fresh, stinking piles; NGOs help communities turn their waste into “humanure” for crops; and one women’s group “calculated” how much waste tainted the food supply.

“We told the community, `If we don’t make proper toilets, it’s like we’re all eating our faeces,’” said Saraswati Maharjam, a member of the sanitation and hygiene education team in Siddhipur village on the outskirts of Kathmandu.

Saraswati Maharjam

“In one year, we’re eating 2kg of faeces, and this is if you live far from the public toilet. If you’re near the public toilet, it’s even more,” Maharjam said, referring to the rough estimate her women’s group came up with to scare neighbours into building toilets.

Open defecation is a major problem in Nepal. According to the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), only about 46 percent of Nepalese have latrines in their homes – and in the least developed districts in the west, that figure drops to 25 percent.

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Nepal, Kalikot: toilet mandatory for citizenship

It has become mandatory for the Kalikot residents to produce a certificate of possessing a toilet in order to obtain a citizenship certificate. In a bid to make Kalikot district open defecation free within 2015, the District Council endorsed 11-point declaration on sanitation last year, which states that those applying for citizenship certificate have to produce a certificate that shows that the applicant has a toilet in his house.

Similarly, the certification would also be mandatory while filing candidacy in local elections. “While only 2 percent population in the district had toilets in their houses until last year, the percentage has surged to 28 percent as of now,” said Ram Prasad Dahal, chief of District Water Supply and Sanitation Sub Division Office. “Number of toilet users has increased as many government and non-government organizations are engaged in making Kalikot an open defecation free district within 2015,” he added.

See also: Nepal mulls toilets-for-passports scheme, Sanitation Updates, 23 Jul 2009

Source: Gorkhapatra / NGO Forum, 28 Jul 2010

Nepal, Chitwan: a toilet revolution

Take a Pee & Get One Rupee. If you have traveled on the Prithvi Highway last year, you must have noticed this seemingly-ridiculous slogan in Darechowk, near Kurintar. Of course, if you have used public toilets before, then you may be more used to paying a rupee to urinate. Instead, members of The Sewa Nepal, a local NGO, pay anyone a rupee if he or she uses their toilet. And no, they are not joking.

“Previously, people used to mock us but now they have realized the message we are trying to convey: Urine is a valuable asset,” says Srirendra Shrestha, founder and coordinator of the NGO. Thus, what the NGO does is collect the urine and convert it to fertilizers for the villagers around. A pretty unique business idea, but there’s more to this than just that.

The NGO, which is involved in environmental conservation and community sanitation, has actively pursued to make Darechowk a model Village Development Committee (VDC). The group’s efforts finally became successful when Darechowk was declared the 18th Open Defecation Free (ODF) VDC in Chitwan a week ago—thus paving the way for a cleaner, sanitized village.

The ODF movement in Nepal has been supported by the Department of Water Supply and Sewerage (DWSS) in coordination with World Health Organization, UNICEF and NGOs like Environment and Public Health Organization (ENPHO). The Sewa Nepal has been the local partner of the movement, providing toilet pans and pipes to individual households in Darechowk. Locals say this is a sanitation movement led by the common people. Thus, among the 1,656 households in the VDC, more than half have a proper toilet. Further, around 770 houses have built an EcoSan (short for ecological sanitation) toilet, the most preferred type as it can collect human waste that can be used as fertiliser.

[…]

Mina Pokharel

Mina Pokharel has been using human manure for the past year and is quite impressed with the results. “After I started using urine as fertilizer, the yield has been very good and the vegetables taste better too,” she says. Did it ever feel disgusting? “It did in the beginning. But once I started reaping the benefits, I realized the value of our own waste.”

This revolutionary ecological movement is spearheaded by the VDC officials themselves. The VDC allocated part of its annual budget to support the movement by providing two sacks of cement to each household with additional monetary support for poor families. “We spent about Rs. 1 million [US$ 13,300 = € 10,100] on this movement,” says VDC secretary Nilkantha Lamichchane. “Declaring the VDC an ODF village has immensely boosted the morale of villagers. We hope to have proper toilets in all the households by the end of this year.”

Teachers have played a central role in this movement, which took its current shape after DWSS conducted a School-Led Total Sanitation project in 2006 in the district. The programme stressed on teaching sanitation habits in schools and also held discussions and sanitation awareness campaigns, besides training teachers on the use of various types of toilets. The programme was largely successful; since then 378 community schools and 239 public and private schools in the district have been declared ODF schools. The excitement associated with this movement has spilled over to adjoining VDCs of neighboring districts as well. Villagers from Makwanpur, Gorkha and Dhading are trying to follow the Darechowk model and implement the programme in earnest. However, no municipality has yet been declared ODF in Nepal.

In a country where only 27 percent of the population has access to sanitation, this model is proving to be one of the few shining lights. Districts like Jajarkot and Rukum saw the deaths of hundreds last year due to diarrhoea, a disease that could have been prevented had this model been implemented there. The ODF model is not only important for health reasons. There are important sociological impacts that having a private toilet has had in Darechowk.

Ask Sadhana Adhikari, for instance. The 15-year-old student says a toilet is the best thing to have happened to her. “I don’t have to suffer any more embarrassments during my periods. The toilet offers me privacy and it’s easier to remain clean during that time.”

Related web site: RCNN – Nepal Node for Sustainable Sanitation (NNSS)

Source: Ujjwal Pradhan, Kathmandu Post / NGO Forum, 24 Jul 2010