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The Herald, April 23, 2015
IMPROVED sanitation can reduce diarrhoeal diseases by more than a third and can significantly lessen the adverse health impact of other disorders responsible for death and disease among millions of children in developing countries.
“Some people born in families living in urban settings take sanitation issues for granted.
“Most have never experienced squatting behind a bush, constantly checking if anyone is coming as they relieve themselves. These are such things that some people may not take seriously when advocated for by those in need.”
These are some of the concerns by young women in Zimbabwe’s remote areas, who until recently had no access to toilets and defecated in the bush.
In Zimbabwe, while many urban households enjoy the luxury of the privacy provided by toilets, people in rural areas still practise open defecation. It is, however, not all gloomy.
In rural areas like Zebra Village, Mtetengwe area in Beitbridge West, open defecation is fast becoming a problem of the past.
Here stands a village that tells a success story of good sanitation interventions in the province.
In this village, a sanitation action group (SAG) of seven members has been working tirelessly to ensure that most households have toilets.
Sanitation Action Groups (SAG), is a team of dedicated, locally-based cadres instituted to get community buy-in and to further support community initiatives in the construction of latrines.
Only two of the 52 households are still to construct toilets and this is remarkable. Mrs Tilivhali Moyo (45) is an SAG member and wants every member of their community to have a toilet come end of 2015.
“Our dream is to ensure that every household has a proper toilet.
“Open defecation poses a lot of health challenges and we want to see everyone in this village move away from that,” she said.
“We realised that our domestic animals are free range and they would eventually unearth and eat these faeces.
“This means when I eventually eat or try to sell my chickens, I will likely get diseases from their waste. People might also frown at buying them.”
With the cost of constructing a toilet far from the reach of many, the community and District Development Fund and other partners like the United Nations Children Fund have assisted. It costs between US$150 and $200 to construct a proper toilet. For long, building a toilet has not been a priority for many in this dry part of Zimbabwe.
“We have also helped build a toilet for a disabled villager in Ward 6. The District Development Fund has also helped with cement and this has triggered the pace of development,” added Moyo.
Just outside each toilet is a hand-washing point. Here, water is stored in a container tied onto a tree using a long rope. The rope is attached to a brick.
“It is easy to wash hands from here. You just step on a string tied to the container and out comes the water,” she said, her son demonstrating how they wash hands.
Before the SAGs and local authorities started advocating for construction of toilets, villagers in this part of the country were using unsafe methods.
“Some were going to the bush but after triggering we encouraged them to share toilets that were already there,” said Beitbridge District Co-ordinator for Water and Sanitation Mr Tinashe Ngundu.
LESSONS FOR TODAY
- Cleanliness in the community is just as important as cleanliness for individuals and families.
- Any community effort to improve sanitation must help people overcome the challenges they face in their daily lives.
- When human waste (faeces) is not managed well, it pollutes water, food, and soil with germs, and leads to diarrhoea and other serious health problems.
- For a toilet to be safe, it must be well-built and in a safe place. No one will use a toilet if they are worried about it collapsing. And if the toilet is far from the home, or in an isolated place, women and children may not feel safe using it.
- When deciding where to build a toilet, make sure it will not pollute any water sources such as rivers, wells, or springs.
Online Reporter