By Khulekani Ngcobo
We have a responsibility to advocate for decent toilets and sanitation. Everyone must have sustainable sanitation, alongside clean water and handwashing facilities, to help protect and maintain our health security and stop the spread of deadly infectious diseases such as Covid-19, cholera and typhoid.
On Thursday, the world commemorates World Toilet Day, an annual event organised by UN Water to raise awareness about the crucial role sanitation plays in reducing disease and creating healthier communities.
Sanitation refers to the sanitation value chain in relation to human waste. A toilet is designed in a way that human waste does not come into contact with the user. Safe containment deals with how the human waste is stored, for example in a tank or channelled to a sewage network.
When toilets are connected to a tank, we refer to it as on-site sanitation; human waste is collected until the tank is filled and it is then emptied – either manually or mechanically using tankers. In the case of a sewer system, human waste is transported through a piped network to a sewage treatment plant where it is treated.
Unsafe management of any of these aspects would lead to human waste coming into contact with the environment and people.
World Toilet Day 2020 focuses on sustainable sanitation and climate change. Climate change is getting worse. Flood, drought and rising sea levels are threatening sanitation systems – from toilets to septic tanks and treatment plants. Sustainable sanitation systems reuse waste to safely boost agriculture, and reduce and capture emissions for greener energy.
How can people lift themselves out of poverty without proper sanitation? Our government needs to expand access to safe toilets. We need solutions and interventions that aim to tackle the challenges impacting on vulnerable groups.
Inequalities in relation to access to sanitation persist. Individuals at a disadvantage are those in the rural areas, the poor Africans in the Eastern Cape, KwaZulu-Natal and Limpopo, for example. However, significant progress has been made, especially in rural provinces where there are large traditional settlements.
There is a decline in the number of households who reported living more than 200m away from the outside yard toilet facilities.
In the Eastern Cape, households’ access to improved sanitation facilities grew from 33.4% to 88% between 2002 and 2018. Flush toilets that were connected to public sewerage systems were most common in the Western Cape (89.1%) and Gauteng (88.6%). Only 26.5% of households in Limpopo had access to flush toilets, the lowest of all the provinces.
To ensure a more co-ordinated approach to water and sanitation management, planning, implementation, monitoring and evaluation, the Department of Water and Sanitation developed the National Water and Sanitation Master Plan. It details the priorities required until 2030 and beyond, to ensure the water security and equitable access to water and sanitation services for all.
Working together is imperative to achieve the National Development Plan 2030 goals, by involving the private sector and business and intensifying community participation.
Building toilets and sanitation systems that work in harmony with the environment is important. When nature calls, we have to listen and act.
Khulekani Ngcobo is the spokesperson of the Department of Water and Sanitation.
The Star