In Nepal - (Hindu country) - here is my take:

• Percentage of squatting toilets in private homes: In larger urban centres: 50% (% decreases the more educated owner is), in rural and small urban towns - 80-100% In larger homes common to have a mix of squatting and seats
• Percentage of squatting toilets in public buildings (including government offices): Nearly all would have some squatting toilets and some may also have seats. For example, airports in out of Kathmandu areas, the vast majority are squatting toilets, but in Kathmandu airport about 50/50 split.
• Any changes you are observing in this pattern over time - over 15 years, more sitting toilets in middle class houses and more in pubic places but not a big increase
• How common is anal cleansing with water (in case we can find a correlation between anal cleansing with water and the use of squatting toilets). Anal cleansing with water is the norm. In middle class to upper class paper is more common, but not uncommon to use water even with squatting toilets.
• Any other comments: Squatting toilets tend to be easier to keep clean. Poorly kept seats are more common and floors are often wet.

• Percentage of squatting toilets in private homes in the UAE (United Arab Emirates) is 20%
• Percentage of squatting toilets in public buildings in the UAE is 20%
• Any changes you are observing in this pattern over time; Sitting toilets are preferred in Dubai because it is a major tourist destination and tourists want to have the same "toilet" experience as back home.
• How common is anal cleansing with water (in case we can find a correlation between anal cleansing with water and the use of squatting toilets) All toilets in the UAE are equipped with anal water cleaning facilities because of the culture here
• Any other comments: No

Dear Dr.Elizabeth
Greetings from the Middle East - Jordan

This is an interesting topic indeed! I strongly believe that squatting toilets in countries like Jordan could be modified to meet many Ecological Sanitation standards and help achieve the UN-MDG's in the soon future.

I have taken a look at the survey questions and wanted to be as precise as possible, but actually it would be hard to give a precise percentage of how many squatting toilets are used in relevance to today's so called "Modern Stools". For now, I could tell you that most of Jordanian bathrooms do have those squatting toilets, but it differs from a city to another, and a region to another in each city, town, or village as well.

Uptown areas in each city of Jordan's 12 cities are tending towards changing to the new stools, while some still stick to the squatting ones even if they live uptown due to personal, traditional and religious reasons. For an indicative average, uptown areas would not formulate more than 20-30% of the cities population. (this range also varies depending on the city)

On the other hand, and in the remaining downtown and public areas, you find some people who tend to reconstruct their bathrooms to meet "Modern Stools" and sanitation standards. I cannot generalize this figure, but you might find 1-2 households that does it out of 10.

For public and governmental places, I can give you an example just to try to help you imagine the situation - I went to a University in Karak - South Jordan to study Water and Environmental Engineering. In our faculty, each W.C. area had from 4-5 units with one of them being a "Modern Stool" while the others were squatting ones. In the professors area, I found that out of 3 units, only 1 is a squatting toilet, and sometimes none. (This is only an example, and it varies from a faculty to another, a public school to a private school to ... etc.)

The only thing I can be certain about, is that Muslim worship houses, organizations and schools do use Squatting Toilets (an exception would be "Modern Stools" for people with special needs).

All the listed above is not all. This is why I felt the importance of sending you this modest thought of the situation in Jordan.

I hope this information would be of value, but if not, please know that I am truly willing to help you conduct any type of survey that would help you get the most accurate figure.

Should you have any concerns or inquiries, please do not hesitate to contact me.

All the best.

===================================================================================================
Ehab Jayyusi
B.Sc Civil / Water and Environmental Engineering.
Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) - Free Lancing Consultant.

Current Position : (WASH) | Projects Design Engineer
International Relief and Development - IRD
Zaatari Camp for Syrian Refugees
Mafraq, Jordan

Hi Elizabeth,

I think in Uganda squatting toilets make up to 90% especially in rural areas. In my village many people never seen a flushing toilet. In some parts of the village, people have no toilets at all, they decide to use bushes. At our school children are struggling even to get the squatting toilet

Dear Elisabeth,

Please see attached answers to the survey questions, prepared by my Afghan colleagues here in Kabul:

For Afghanistan:

• Percentage of squatting toilets in private homes: 99 %
• Percentage of squatting toilets in public buildings: 99 %
• Any changes you are observing in this pattern over time: yes over 10 year ago they just used dry mud for cleaning genitals, and now they are using toilet papers instead of dry mud and using water, but no changes will occur in using urinals. However, more wealthy people in urban areas (Kabul), residents install western style toilets so they have both systems in their house (western style and squatting toilet)
• How common is anal cleansing with water: mostly people use water for cleansing anal and rural villages people use dry mud and after that in ablution they use water for cleaning anal before praying.
• Any other comments: none

Kind regards,
Alex Miller

BORDA e.V.
Bremen Overseas Research and Development Association

Regional Director Middle East & Central Asia
Web: www.borda-afg.org

Dear Elizabeth,

according to my experiences from Afghanistan,

-Percentage of squatting toilets in private homes

its coverage is almost 100 % in urban areas, but in rural area in some places still we have open defecation.we should keep in mind that some squatting toilets are water-based and some others are not which depends to availability of water.

- Percentage of squatting toilets in public buildings

around 90 % squatting toilet, but some building including modern building have around 10% commode toilet.


- Any changes you are observing in this pattern over time
it seems in new official building and some residential, we have a mix of squatting and seat toilets.

- How common is anal cleansing with water (in case we can find a correlation between anal cleansing with water and the use of squatting toilets)

Usually shia community is washer ans sunni community is wiper...but access to water is also an important factor.

Regards,
Hussain

Dear Elizabeth,
For my country Indonesia, it looks like this:

• Percentage of squatting toilets in private homes: 100 % in rural area, but only around 20% in the city
• Percentage of squatting toilets in public buildings: 20 % in the city, nearly 100% in rural area

• Any changes you are observing in this pattern over time: Yes, commonly housholed toilet in the city using sitting toilet, with flush and water from shower nearby the toilet to clean up the anal. But, in the rural area they still use squatting toilets. Only for those who are rich or in high level of social status, they will prefer to have sitting toilet.

• How common is anal cleansing with water (in case we can find a correlation between anal cleansing with water and the use of squatting toilets): Of course for both sitting and squatting toilet, there always water around for anal cleansing. It’s rare to have really dry toilet, not water splashes on the floor. Except for toilet that include high technology inside, so just push the bottom and there will be water come out through your anal. For this type of toilet, there also tissue inside and using it to dry up the anal and the seat. Usually this hi-tech sitting toilet in public buildings such as five star hotel or large company office building or mall/ huge department store.

• Any other comments: none

Best regards,
Aline Ardhiani

DEAR ELIZABETH,
ABOUT INDIA IN RURAL AREAS 95% USE SQUATTING PANS BUT IN URBAN CITIES ITS LIKE 40% ONLY . BUT OVER ALL INDIA 90% USE SQUATTING PANS.

THANKS WITH REGARDS
FOR SHITAL SANITARY
RASHESH

In Iran it is very rare even in remote rural open excretion is problem with bright ancient civilization and as Muslim country cleaning (Tahrat) in Farsi and Arabic is obligation after toilet and also is the precondition for praying (5 times praying every day)

you have written correctly "urinals in public places are not common in Muslim countries due to the Islamic toilet etiquette " ( in this thread ) because of splashing possibilty on foot and hand or clothes.
here (squatch)sitting toilet is traditional toilet but western toilet(toilet farangei) also use in Hotels ,guesthouses and even private house but not custom today many modern houses bulid both toilet traditional and western because elder people be comfortable in western kind.
about cleaning (Tharat) is obligation all Muslim must wash clean their anus and genital organ with plenty water after toilet .They use a lot of water for their clean washing ,something I had written for you about water shortage here and My interested in wetland constructions development in these region for water recycling and using at least for agriculture or green circle around every village, I don't know whether you remember or not ?

Elisabeth , here there is not open excretion from thousands of years here in even poor region people use of absorbed well for toilet and use of collected excretion as fertilizer but in recent decades because of public health hazard this kind of fertilizer excluded for agrofood application.But here sanitation and waste treatment network has not developed yet in even most cities exception partially in few large cities.
About toliet with 2 hole for urine and stool separation here I think it will be applicable and I personally ASK Muslim clerk about using of urine as liquid fertilizer he told me no problem from religion point of view.
I send picture of general toilet use in Iran (pictures from internet)

I hope these explanation will be useful .

regards
Mohammad
www.fpp.ir
Telfax:009837629569
P.O box:91865-358
Mashhad,Iran

Dear Elizabeth,

To complete my answer on Egypt, the figures I gave are in the Nile delta (with most of the time squatting toilets) in rural areas which are densely populated (includes villages and buildings).
In Cairo so far I have only seen sitting toilets with flush or pour flush and most of the time equipped for washers (external shower pipe or sometimes a pipe inside the toilet) and alos quite often with toilet paper. It is not a habit to throw toilet paper in the toilet bowl but in a trash can next to the toilet or directly on the floor on a pile in case there is no trash can. Probably a wise habit caused by frequent clogging.

Cecile

Don't be scared; Wikipedia is what it is - people who are editing on Wikipedia, like myself, are trying their best to get it right and to use hiqh quality sources, but you can never prevent people from drawing wrong conclusions from what they read on Wikipedia.

Obviously, a full-blown scientific survey of all countries would be much better. But who has the time to do so? Or has it already been done and I haven't found it yet on the internet?

As a second best solution, I think a qualitative survey of "sanitation experts" - and many of the people who have responsed to this survey can be called "sanitation experts" - is also OK in my opinion (only second best but better than nothing!). I have seen many MSc theses and PhD theses who have relied on interviews with experts to develop certain approaches or conclusions.

The aim is to improve what it currently says about in which regions squat toilets are used, namely (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Squat_toilet#Regions):

Regions [edit source | edit]
Squat toilets are commonly found in Asia, Africa, and the Middle East but can also occasionally be found in some European (Romania, Southern France), Mediterranean, and Latin and South American countries. Squat toilets are not common in Central and Northern Europe, North America, Australia.

In Latin and South America, toilets that use water for flushing (flush toilets) are always of the sitting type, whereas toilets that do not use water for flushing (pit latrines and urine-diverting dry toilets) may be of either type, i.e. to be used in a sitting or a squatting position.

This information on Wikipedia is not yet very good. It makes no statements about

• the differences between rural vs. urban
• the differences between public vs. private homes
• Nor does it explain how there is a general trend from squatting to sitting, like we have seen in many of the responses of the survey.
• Nor does it say anything about the relationship with Ismalic toilet etiquette (as Mughal had pointed out earlier in this conversation, see: forum.susana.org/forum/categories/141-ot...-squat-toilets#12401)

So my aim is simply to improve the current content on Wikipedia as best as I can (using feedback I am getting from peers here). If someone else in future wants to build on that, or do more detailed survey and then add that information to the article, then be my guest. It is always a process of progressive improvements on Wikipedia.

My work on Wikipedia has made me realise that a lot of the content is rather focussed on the U.S. (and readers are led to think that the statements are valid globally). Little attention is paid to the differences in developing countries or to Muslim cultures. This reflects the experiences levels of many of the editors. Therefore, I am trying to make my modest contributions to improving the Wikipedia articles in that respect: add the developing countries perspective, add the Muslim perspective where it differs (e.g. anal cleansing with water, squatting toilets).

I hope this makes my intentions clearer and alleviates your worries?

Oh, and I am not planning to cite numbers like "20% of toilets in rural Tanzania are sitting toilets". Perhaps this is what scared you. I have asked people in this survey to give numbers, but afterwards I will translate that (for the Wikipedia article) to "most of the people in rural Tanzania", i.e. into qualitative statements.

Regards,
Elisabeth

I don´t know if this is the right way:
a) I think this is the best guess you will get, but I would never guess for the countries I work in as I think my best guess is not good enough for an "official" document.
b) the idea of bringing it to something "citable" scares me if THAT is enough for Wikipedia because c) someone might use the information for a certain country and build some conclusion on that, even though it was more generally thought.
d) what is the aim of the survey - just the number? Why, what for? We do know that squatting and sitting are two ways. What additional Information would that bring?

Regards
Christoph