Business analysis of fecal sludge management

Emptying truck Phnom Penh, Cambodia. Photo from publication.

This study was initiated and funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to map the urban sanitation situation and assesses business and operating models for fecal sludge management in 30 cities across 10 countries in Africa and Asia, specifically focussing on the extraction and transportation market segments. The study was carried out in Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Kenya, Nigeria and Senegal in Africa and Bangladesh, Cambodia, India, Malaysia and Viet Nam in South/Southeast Asia.

Using a common analytical framework, teams of local consultants in each of the ten countries gathered users’ perspectives through 13,000 household surveys and the collected data on the financial and business models of 150 emptying service providers. This report presents the comparative analysis based on these data from those surveys.

A majority of households (5.6 million households) in the 30 cities use on-site sanitation facilities. Households spend only a small percentage of their income, on average less 4%, on emptying services. About one third of surveyed households (2 million households) rely on manual emptying for sludge management.

The total available market for emptying services across the 10 cities is an estimated US$ 134 million.

Some regional trends were seen in the business operations between Africa and Asia:

• average truck capacity in Asia is just over 3 cubic metres and in Africa around 10 cubic metres – tracking the differing average pit volumes (2 cubic metres in Asia vs. 7 cubic metres in Africa)
• age of emptying trucks in Africa is 15 to over 30 years and in Asia between 5 to 10 years
• local assembly of trucks in done in Asia, while businesses in Africa import second hand trucks
• the cost of the trucks is three times higher in Africa than in Asia
• in Asia the operating expenses per truck are about US$ 11,000 and three times that much in Africa
• African businesses spend 76% of their expenses on variable charges such as fuel and maintenance, while their Asian counterparts spend most of their expenses (62%) on fixed costs – mainly staff salaries
• the single largest component of operating costs in Africa is fuel, making up 40% of expenses.
• the annual profit per truck in Africa is US$ 12,000 and is twice that seen in Asia, due to the higher empting fee charged (US$ 60 vs. US$ 28 in Asia) and the larger number of trips per day per truck in Africa.

A general finding was that the size of the fleet was the only factor that had a clear and strong correlation to profitability of the business – two or more trucks were needed to become profitable. There was also a lack of support systems necessary to create sustainable and profitable businesses.

The report presents several recommendations to realise the potential of the US$ 134 million market for emptying services, including:

• supporting the scaling of the single truck operators to become mid to large sized operations;
• better access to finance
• introducing transfer stations to save fuel costs and increasing truck efficiency
• regulating scheduled desludging
• local manufacture or assembly of trucks, especially in Africa
• a more effective supply chain for spare parts
• constructing safe dumping sites for sludge and sludge treatment plants
• enabling sludge reuse

Chowdhry, S. and Kone, D., 2012. Business analysis of fecal sludge management : emptying and transportation services in Africa and Asia. Seattle, WA, USA: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. 116 p.; 47 fig.; 22 tab. With bibliography  p. 115-116
Available at: <http://www.washdoc.info/docsearch/title/179741>

SanMark Community of Practice

The Sanitation Marketing (SanMark) Community of Practice  is a WASH Reference Group initiative supported by the AusAID Innovations Fund and managed by WaterAid Australia.

The WASH Reference Group is an Australian-based Community of Practice comprising 25 organisations working on water, sanitation and hygiene promotion in developing countries, including NGOs, research organisations and the Australian water industry.

The website provides information on SanMark webinars and in-country training events. Visitors to the website can submit a question (Ask an Expert), contribute a case study, story, experience or photographs to the SanMark blog, and apply online for a SanMark practitioner training. There is also section on resources (links and tools) and news.

Website: www.sanitationmarketing.com

Managing water locally : an essential dimension of community water development

Bunclark, L., Carter, R., Casey, V., Day, St J., and Guthrie, D. (2011). Managing water locally : an essential dimension of community water development. London, UK, Institution of Civil Engineers; Oxford, UK, Oxfam GB and London, UK, WaterAid. 95 p. : boxes, fig., tab. Includes glossary. 48 ref.
Oxfam Online ISBN 978-1-78077-011-6
Download full publication [2 MB]

Based on experiences from three continents, this publication provides practical guidelines for water sector practitioners, policy-makers and donors on Community-Based Water Resource Management (CBWRM).

SWITCH in the city: putting urban water management to the test

Butterworth, J. (ed.); McIntyre, P. (ed.); Da Silva Wells, C. (ed.) (2011). SWITCH in the city : putting urban water management to the test. The Hague, The Netherlands, IRC International Water and Sanitation Centre. v, 413 p.; fig.; tab.; boxes.
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With more than half the planet’s population living in urban areas, and rapid growth predicted, cities present a daunting test in water management. Their scale and concentrated populations provide a special challenge in providing water and sanitation services, creating a safe and pleasant environment, and handling wastes. As sustainability concerns have risen up the agenda, the challenge is for cities to do more, with less. To provide better services to all citizens, with less negative and more positive environment impacts on cities and their rural hinterlands. The SWITCH project was a five year experiment focused on some of the key sustainability challenges in urban water management. In a number of cities around the globe, it set out to test what was needed for a transition to more sustainable urban water management through a combination of demand-led research, demonstration activities, multistakeholder learning and associated training and capacity building. The book brings together the experiences of 12 cities involved in the SWITCH project from four continents (Accra, Alexandria, Beijing, Belo Horizonte, Birmingham, Bogotá, Cali, Hamburg, Lima, Lodz, Tel Aviv and Zaragoza) with a set of guidelines focused on promoting stakeholder engagement in such processes. It is targeted at people interested in undertaking demand-led research, promoting multi-stakeholder engagement, and scaling up research impacts, not only in urban water management but also in other areas where we find such complex and ‘wicked’ problems. [authors abstract]

Integrating sanitation marketing into a national program: a case study in Vietnam

Nguyen, H.H. (2011). Integrating sanitation marketing into a national program : a case study in Vietnam. Brisbane, QLD, Australia, International Water Centre.
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Supply-driven approaches to rural sanitation in Viet Nam, with associated toilet subsidies, have had little success over the last decade. Since 2003, International Development Enterprises (IDE) Vietnam has achieved better results in several pilots with an alternative approach involving rural sanitation marketing. As a result, the Danish International Development Agency (DANIDA) has supported IDE in collaboration with the Health Environment Agency of the Ministry of Health (MOH) (HEMA) to implement a rural sanitation marketing pilot project within the National Target Program II (NTP II) program in Quang Tri province since 2010. This report  provides an analysis of the potential as well as the constraints for integrating sanitation marketing into NTP II.

Introductory Guide to Sanitation Marketing and Online Toolkit

Introductory Guide to Sanitation Marketing, 2011.
Print and Online Toolkit, by Jacqueline Devine and Craig Kullmann, Water and Sanitation Program.
Download Full-text (pdf) and view Online Toolkit

Sanitation marketing is an emerging field with a relatively small group of practitioners who are learning by doing. With an Introductory Guide to Sanitation Marketing and a companion online toolkit the Water and Sanitation Program (WSP) seeks to contribute to the field by sharing practical guidance on the design, implementation, and monitoring of rural sanitation marketing programs at scale in India, Indonesia, and Tanzania, plus additional projects implemented in Cambodia and Peru.

The online toolkit includes narrated overviews, videos, and downloadable documents including research reports, sample questionnaires, and more.

Sanitation marketing, together with Community-led Total Sanitation (CLTS) and behaviour change are the three core components WSP’s approach to scaling up rural sanitation, which also includes strengthening the enabling environment.

Supporting rural water supply: moving towards a service delivery approach

Lockwood, H. and Smits, S. (2011). Supporting rural water supply : moving towards a service delivery approach. London, UK, Practical Action and The Hague, The Netherlands, IRC International Water and Sanitation Centre. xii, 187 p. : 11 boxes, 13 fig., 14 tab. Includes references, glossary and index.
Download full publication and supporting country studies
Order hard copy (price: £13.46)

Collectively, billions of dollars have been invested in the provision of rural water supply systems in developing countries over the past three decades. Although progress is being made and rates of coverage are increasing, users often find that, once installed, water supply systems are poorly maintained and eventually break down, leaving them with an unreliable and disrupted water supply.

Supporting Rural Water Supply takes a critical look and asks why we have been unable to provide a sustainable water service to rural people for so long? What are the critical success factors in the areas where there has been good progress? How can we support the adoption of a service delivery approach to rural water supply – one that moves beyond implementing infrastructure projects to delivering a reliable and indefinite service?

This book brings together findings from 13 country studies which were carried out as part of a global learning initiative – Sustainable Services at Scale, or Triple-S. It offers insights into ways countries and individual organisations can move towards a service delivery approach step by step and is a valuable resource for professionals in government departments, NGOs, development banks, and donor agencies who are interested in improving the design and implementation of rural water supply programmes and the benefits from investments. (publisher’s abstract).

Read the summaries or full reports for Benin, Burkina Faso, Colombia, Ethiopia, Ghana, Honduras, India, Mozambique, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Thailand, USA, and Uganda.

The results from the Triple-S 13-country study were discussed and reviewed at a joint event organised on 27 September 2011 by the World Bank and USAID. Video, presentations and background documents available at: https://water.worldbank.org/water/node/84057

Water ethics and water resource management

Liu, J. … [et al.] (2011). Water ethics and water resource management. Bangkok, Thailand, UNESCO Asia and Pacific Regional Bureau for Education. 84 p.; 17 fig.; 3 tab. 81 ref.
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This report examines ethical issues associated with water resource utilization and management, including its uses in energy and other domains. Under the “Ethics and Climate Change in Asia and the Pacific” (ECCAP) project, the Water Ethics working group has compiled a report with some case studies highlighting different ethical issues associated with water resource utilization and management. The report systematically discusses how water ethics can make a difference to water related practices and provides a cross-cultural review of the issues. The report reveals gaps in existing knowledge to researchers, policy makers and funders of research, which could be used to examine linkages between research and policy making, and presents areas of policy options to governments. [authors abstract]

Gender in Pacific WASH

This is the web site of the project “Researching Gender Aspects of Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Projects with Pacific Communities” (2009-2011).

The study focuses on two Pacific case studies that incorporate gender strategies and support community decision making processes: World Vision’s Participatory Hygiene and Sanitation Transformation (PHAST) initiatives in rural Vanuatu and Live and Learn’s water governance and sustainable communities projects in Fiji.

The research findings have been translated into a set of guidance materials for organisations undertaking water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) activities. The guidance materials include a resource guide, flash cards, a poster, and case study snapshots.

The research project was implemented by the Institute for Sustainable Futures (ISF) and the International Women’s Development Agency (IWDA) with funding from the Australian Agency for International Development (AusAID).

Web site: genderinpacificwash.info

How to integrate water, sanitation and hygiene into HIV programmes

Bery, R.; Rosenbaum, J. (2010). How to integrate water, sanitation and hygiene into HIV programmes. Geneva, Switzerland, World Health Organization (WHO). 113 p. : 5 boxes, 7 tab. Bibliography: p. 59-70. – Includes glossary
ISBN 978-92-4-154801-4
Download full report

This document integrates Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) practices into HIV care. It draws on experiences from the USAID-funded Hygiene Improvement Project (USAID/HIP) . It contains guidance on implementing priority WASH practices, including WASH in global and national HIV/AIDS policy and guidance, and integrating WASH–HIV programmes.

Chapter 1 provides an overview of the document and some background on the evidence of the importance of WASH, the burden of unsafe water and sanitation, and effective WASH practices.

Chapter 2 provides guidance on the WASH practices that national HIV/AIDS programmes should implement as a priority, and outlines a recommended approach for improving WASH practices. The chapter includes detailed
descriptions of recommended practices such as steps for hand washing, strategies for treating water and methods of food handling.

Chapter 3 describes steps to integrate WASH into key HIV-related reference documents such as policies, guidelines and handbooks, on a national and global level.

Chapter 4 provides examples of specific language that can be used to modify HIV/AIDS policies and related materials, using safe drinking water as an example.

Chapter 5 presents interventions that could be considered for programme approaches for WASH–HIV integration, depending on local priorities and resources. The chapter includes practical case studies to provide snapshots of the types of integrated HIV–WASH interventions that different programmes are trying in Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, South Africa, Uganda and Viet Nam.

The annexes provide practical tools that can be adapted to the local context, and more detailed descriptions of the evidence and literature on WASH and HIV.