Scaling up container-based sanitation: breakthroughs and bottlenecks to citywide inclusive sanitation

Summary

Container Based Sanitation uses specially designed toilets which collect human excreta in sealable, removable containers (sometimes called cartridges) which are then transported to treatment facilities for safe processing. This study aimed to understand how institutional, legal and regulatory contexts enable the sustainability of CBS business models and to assess is the designs of CBS services are inclusive or whether they increase disparities within and between vulnerable groups and individuals. CBS units are easy to remove, which seems like an ideal solution for residents with insecure land tenancy, but this temporary nature itself perpetuates residents’ perceived and actual sense of insecurity.

Main body

Alternative approaches are required to deliver inclusive, adequate and sustainable sanitation services across the delivery chain to all urban residents. Container Based Sanitation (CBS) that uses specially designed toilets which collect human excreta in sealable, removable containers (sometimes called cartridges) which are then transported, up to three times a week, to treatment facilities for safe processing. This is an alternative traditional pit latrines which may only be emptied every few years (if at all). Pilot CBS initiatives have emerged in several countries and the diversity of forms and contexts of these now allows for an analysis of their scope and scale.. For CBS services to contribute meaningfully to achieving universal sanitation they must be embedded in formal and informal systems of local governance . This paper presents three cases where the governance context of CBS is different, with the service provided respectively by; NGOs (Sanima, Peru), private entrepreneurs (Sanergy, Kenya) and by the municipality (City of Cape Town (CoCT), South Africa) although the distinction between NGOs and private entrepreneurs can be fuzzy. Each provider interacts with users, regulators and municipal services differently.

Many aspects of the CBS service have been designed to provide more equitable sanitation to vulnerable users for example, physically placed within households so that people with disabilities (PWDs) do not have to travel to find a toilet. However, CBS may entrench inequalities within settlements and households if PWDs become less visible within their settlement as they leave the residence less often. The realities of CBS at a user and operator level need to be interrogated. For example, studies on access to sanitation tend to focus at the household level, yet intra-household dynamics and preferences mean that the presence of sanitation within a household does not ensure that it is used – or experienced in the same way - by all members of a household.

Thus the objectives are:
1. To understand how institutional, legal and regulatory contexts enable the sustainability of CBS business models?
2. To assess is the designs of CBS services are inclusive or whether they increase disparities within and between vulnerable groups and individuals.

Data has been collected from stakeholders including CBS enterprise staff at all levels, from CEOs to franchisees to cleaners) and other local actors including local government, utilities and regulators using semi-structured interviews. A case study based approach has been used to understand the operations of CBS in each location. It has been analysed under a political economy framework that seeks to understand processes of power, politics, institutions and governance. This has allowed an investigation of the dynamics of inclusion and exclusion.
The study has confirmed how reluctant municipalities are to deliver permanent sanitation services to residents without land tenure. There are often “fantasy plans” to provide sewered services but these tend to lack the political commitment, financing and institutional capability for their implementation. To fill the gap, either the municipalities themselves (in the case of Cape Town) or NGOs (in the case of Nairobi and Lima) are providing limited and small-scale CBS, which has no permanent infrastructure. The acceptability of this temporary solution varies, and not simply because of the quality of service (for example reliability of the collection service). The paper will reflect on the demand and acceptability of CBS as a dignified and just sanitation service and how this varies according to the political and historical nature of the context. In Cape Town, the municipality offering a CBS as a temporary service create tensions and anxieties from some citizens who are concerned it will replace a preferred permanent full flush solution.

Conclusions

CBS provides an alternative option for people living in unsewered areas to get safely managed sanitation and for many users increases their wellbeing as well as contributing to wider public and environmental health. However, CBS is considered a stop gap measure to sanitation provision both by those responsible for sanitation provision and the citizens served. Technologically, CBS units are easy to remove, which seems like an ideal solution for residents with insecure land tenancy, but this temporary nature itself perpetuates residents’ perceived and actual sense of insecurity, and widens the gap between them and the city’s more affluent residents.