Dedicated $2.5m African sanitation research fund hosts first workshop

29th January 2014

By: Natalie Greve

Creamer Media Contributing Editor Online

  

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Water research body the South African Water Research Commission (WRC) will host the first workshop of the $2.5-million Sanitation Research Fund for Africa (SRFA), from January 30 to 31, in Johannesburg, in an effort to stimulate competency and capacity in the area of sanitation on the continent and support the development and upscaling of sanitation solutions.

In an effort to respond to the lack of dedicated sources of funding and support for sanitation research and innovation in Africa, the WRC and charity the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation last year launched the SRFA, which would be led and executed by the WRC.

Eight sub-Saharan countries had been selected to participate in the SRFA project, which was based on recent experiences from South Africa and the region, where the upscaling of dry sanitation systems as a basic minimum acceptable level of service had started to present several operational and maintenance-related challenges.

“With many ventilated improved latrine (VIP) units implemented to date, the eThekwini municipality was the first to highlight these issues, with around 30 000 VIPs filling up or nearly full.

“The removal and transportation of the pit sludges was shown to be challenging, as many of these toilets were located in dense settlements, in hilly terrain and with limited road access,” commented WRC executive manager for water use and waste management Jay Bhagwan.

To add to the challenge, he said the safe disposal of VIP sludge was also problematic, as municipal landfills were not recommended as disposal sites and the introduction of highly concentrated pit sludges into the wastewater treatment network compromised the treatment process.

“This problem is not only confined to South Africa, as many other countries where upscaling of dry sanitation technologies [has been undertaken] are experiencing similar challenges,” Bhagwan noted.

In response, the SRFA initiative aimed to stimulate local capacity to provide local solutions by encouraging a partnership between local government and students studying towards master’s and PhD degrees.

WRC SRFA manager Sudhir Pillay added that, while significant investment was being made to advance developing countries, the bulk of this focused on the establishment of new infrastructure, with very little attention afforded to what already existed on the ground and issues of longer-term sustainability.

“While sustainability issues already hamper small-scale applications throughout sub-Saharan Africa, the upscaling of dry sanitation will face many challenges and, inevitably, unintended consequences both in rural and urban areas.

“There is a clear need that, when upscaling dry sanitation programmes, these programmes provide the necessary attention to operation and maintenance, institutional support, communication and support to users. Current programmes often do not address these issues.  This neglect, if continued, will increase backlogs and will make future challenges more complex,” Pillay cautioned.

Edited by Tracy Hancock
Creamer Media Contributing Editor

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