Dear Mughal and dear Patient,

Thank you both for your kind messages. I also wish you the best for 2015 and success in your projects.

Kind regards,

Cecile

Madame Cécile,

I am a Congolese by nationality,medical doctor and Public Health officer by professional currently working in Northern Uganda in post conflict areas.

First,I would like to wish you and your family Happy new year 2015

Secondly,I do appreciate so much your background and general opinion toward sanitation! Indeed if we have super powers, one thing we would like to change in the sanitation sector is Behaviours of the people, politicians, professionals, planners and private sector,especially in Africa.

It is very simple to confirm that donors and local government are not fully supporting the promotion of sanitation,this areas is always underfunded compare to the funds allocated for malaria ,HIV, agriculture,army,etc

The main factors associated with poor usage of sanitation facilities in Developing country are inadequate sanitation facilities, lack of safe water, and poor attitudes and practices on use of sanitation facilities.

Some NGOs have tried to build sanitation facilities in several areas which often went unused,there is need to develop a practical strategies in policy and practice that may improve the use of sanitation facilities in rural areas and promote health education focus on knowledge, attitude, and practice of population towards sanitation.

This may eventually contribute to the reduction of the burden of sanitation-related diseases and promote the health of population. If the component of behaviour change is not addressed, it will be always difficult for the poor community in rural areas in developing country to promote sanitation.

"It always seems impossible until it happen"

Patient Myango(MD,MPH0)

Dear Cecile,

Many thanks for your useful response. You have provided a wealth of information. I deeply appreciate.

Kind regards, and Happy New Year!

F H Mughal

Dear Mughal,

Excuse my late reply du to the busy season ...
As far as the name of "featured user" or "hall of fame" is concerned. I have no opinion really, particularly not in English as it is not my mother's tongue. But as you certainly noticed I did reuse your suggested expression "hall of fame" in the interview !

Marginalised population : yes, there are poor people in France : homeless people, people who share toilet facilities in buildings (extremely small rooms are rented to poor people at a very high price with poor facilities and poor maintenance) and camps of "roms" (people from eastern Europe). As far as individual sanitation is concerned, generally people have toilets but not everyone can upgrade individual waste water treatment system (for those who are not connected to the sewers) which costs at least 5000 € per family.Ugrading individual waste water systems has become compulsory to protect underground water and not everyone can afford it.

Waste water treatment plants : I am not a specialist of WWTP but there are different technologies used, biological or chemical : activated sludge, aerated lagoons, ponds, etc. Constructed wetlands are also developping. The management is done at municipal or intermunicipal (several municipalities gather to treat their waste water together) level. Direct management (what we call a "regie" ) is quite rare and often the municipality(ies) delegate waste water management to private companies (the most famous being Veolia and Lyonnaise des eaux and all their subsidiaries).

"Treated" effluent is not reused. It is always rejected in water bodies and this has a negative impact on the quality of rivers in France (and in Europe in General) because of the level of nitrogen and because of hormones (especially residues from contraceptive pills). (Treated effluent from a private industry can be reused by this industry

Individual sanitation : soak away pits are not allowed by the legislation and a secondary treatment has to be installed after the septic tank. There are several options for a secondary treatment : sand filter, UASB, fixed media systems (what we call "micro stations"), zeolite filter, etc. The aim is that the effluent from a secondary treatment system complies with a set of stardard values (BOD, COD, coliforms, etc.)

Thank you for your questions Mughal !

Best wishes for 2015.

Cecile

Dear Cecile,

I was expecting that you will be the next Featured User of the Month, because of your continuing significant and useful contributions. How right I was!! Congratulations. You fully deserve this distinction!

Just some points:

Do you agree with the title - Featured User of the Month? To me, I'm afraid, it is not quite appealing. I proposed "induction in the Hall of Fame," as we have in AIT (www.ait.ac.th), but Elisabeth would not agree.

You say:

"I worked in the sanitation sector in France between 2010 and 2013. On one side we could say that France has a very good sanitation situation, full access or almost (there are always marginalized population that should not be forgotten), 90% of the population connected to sewers with wastewater treatment plants and 10% of the population with individual sanitation. The health of the population is probably on the top 5 of the ladder of all countries in the world."

Could I kindly know, what do you mean by "marginalized population?" Is it poor of the poorest population?

It is nice to know that 90% of the population is connected with wastewater treatment plants. Could you kindly specify what types of wastewater treatment plants you have in France; and which agency is responsible for their O&M (operation and maintenance), and for effluent quality control? Is treated wastewater reused in France?

I reckon, with "individual sanitation," you mean septic tank-soak pit system, right? Please allow me to use the term "water," for a while - Are the water and wastewater treatment systems same in Paris and Marseille?

Regards,

F H Mughal

Part 3: About Cécile’s opinions about the forum

What is making you write on the forum - what do you expect by making posts? How have you benefited yourself from using the forum?

I like sharing information with peers, bridging the language gap (French / English), making a bridge between cultures.
I benefit a lot from the forum from a practical point of view. I have more theoretical knowledge than field experience in sanitation, therefore I really learn a lot from all the practical questions such as faecal sludge management.

Do your colleagues or people in your network also use the forum?

I also follow the exchanges of the French ecological sanitation network named le Réseau d’assainissement écologique and few members of this network also use the forum. I sometimes make links between both networks when I see a post which can be interesting for one network or the other.

I have a friend working in the social sector in France and once we exchanged on our jobs and the way we work. She was amazed to learn about the existence of such tools such as the forum and the website. She said it would be incredibly useful if in her own professional field if she could rely on such a tool, sharing experience, getting advice from peers on how to tackle this or that situation. I think we are very lucky to have this forum.

What don’t you like about the forum or about other forum users?

For the past year I sometimes feel overwhelmed by the number of posts. But it shows the success of the forum, the need for many questions to be answered and the willingness of members to share their experience and help others for the sake of a cause that we believe in.
Other than that, I like everything about the forum and the forum users!

If you could change something about the forum, what would it be?

I would improve the search option as there are so many posts: by author, topic, keywords and allow to limit the scope of the search (forum only, dates). Sometimes I am looking for information and I find it difficult to retrieve it, although I know there has been a discussion about the topic in the past. There is already a discussion thread about this topic here .
It would be nice to insert a link somewhere to the former ecosanres forum as many topics were also deeply discussed in that forum.I like the new layout and category arrangement.
I also belong to other forums and I find this is the best professional forum on this topic by far!
I also enjoy the human dimension and this idea of featured user, not so much for the pride of being in the “hall of fame” of pee and poo but to get to know our peers better. Sometimes the posts of forum users make even more sense when you know about the person’s experience and where they come from.

Which topics or categories on the forum do you feel most passionate about?

Vermi-composting and generally all composting and treatment processes, constructed wetlands, and feacal sludge management.

Do you think we should try and include more non-English content on the Forum?

I think a lot was done for bridging the language divide: bilingual newsletters and newsmail, google translation tool. It would be nice to see SuSanA’s new website come back in French and Spanish, to have the working group factsheets translated in those languages. Maybe adding tags in French and Spanish would be useful as well.

With tags I mean this: As an example, in the past I did quite a lot of work on Ecodomeo’s website in order to get more visitors. As an administrator of the website I was writing down the tags as an administrator in a special tag area on the webpages, for example each time I was writing an article, on each picture I inserted, on each webpage etc. in order to be referenced as much as possible in google search. The aim is that the website appears on the first or second page when a user is running search on “dry toilets” for example.
I think it could be quite easy to do with SuSanA’s website but I am not sure how it is with the forum.

Posted by Elisabeth von Muench and Shobana Srinivasan (intern) for the SuSanA secretariat

Part 2: Cecile's personal interests and her thoughts on sanitation

Here's a continuation of Cecile's interview. In this part, she expresses her views on sanitation and tells more about herself.

Where do you work now and what does your organization do? How is it funded?

I have been in Cairo since January 2014 and I ended up there because my husband also works in development (not in sanitation!) and he got a job here. Since I have arrived I have mostly done distance work: technical translations, desk studies, proposal writing for tenders in the field of sanitation such as feacal sludge management or public toilets and the following value chain, but to participate in project as an “expert” an engineering degree is most of the time requested along with 10 to 15 years of experience in the field …
It is interesting to write project methodologies, but now that I am back in a developing country I would be happy to be more operational. It is quite frustrating to work in front of a computer when there are many needs outside and things to change through implementation.


What would you recommend to young people from all countries who want to get involved in development work – how should they go about it? And does it even make sense?
What do you see as the biggest threats and the biggest opportunities for the future of France (in terms of sanitation) - your country of origin?

I worked in the sanitation sector in France between 2010 and 2013. On one side we could say that France has a very good sanitation situation, full access or almost (there are always marginalized population that should not be forgotten), 90% of the population connected to sewers with wastewater treatment plants and 10% of the population with individual sanitation. The health of the population is probably on the top 5 of the ladder of all countries in the world.

However, there is a threat with the governance of the sector and the high cost of sanitation.
The management of sanitation has been delegated to private companies or in the form of PPP or lease contracts (affermage). This solution is presented by many agencies as very good governance solution. The French experience has proven that it is not always the case. As a matter of fact private companies are criticized because they gain high dividends at the cost of poor maintenance which results in leaking networks (as much as 30% of the water networks, I do not have the figure for sewers) whereas maintenance work is paid in advance through users’ billings. Civil society organizations also recall an obvious lack of control of the obligations and financial accounts of these societies by the municipalities or by an independent organization. In some areas municipalities have decided not to renew contracts with the private sector and take the responsibility of water and waste water management through direct management (under the form of a syndicat).
The privatization of water and sanitation services has also led to significant differences in the prices of the services. Depending on where you live, you will pay from less than 3€ to more than 6 € per m3 of water (which is still very cheap).
The trend for many years has been to connect as many houses as possible to the sewers network at very high costs (pumps, km of pipes etc.) and sometimes against all common sense (wastewater treatment plant on the other side of the hill). Today France is going through an economic crisis and it is financially difficult to maintain these facilities properly (as municipalities fund capital investment and importance maintenance work with external subsidies which have dropped drastically).

Another threat is that the system is always based on more technology and on more standards. This can be illustrated by the situation in individual sanitation. 10% of households have individual sanitation systems, which were built 30 years ago and even before and are obsolete (generally a non-water tight septic tank and a soak away pit), leading to ground water contamination in some areas. Households have to upgrade their systems and replace it by an “approved system”. To be approved technical solutions (e.g. micro-stations sort of UASB, coconut filter, sand filter, constructed wetlands, etc.) to be tested on a scientific platform at a high price (approx. 100 000 euros) which has paved the way to manufactured waste water treatment which produce sludge (which then needs to be pumped and transported and treated in septage treatment plants) and has made it much harder for lower cost, sustainable and simple technologies to make their way through (dry toilets associated to composting, constructed wetlands for waste water or for grey water, rainwater harvesting systems, etc.).

We could anticipate that current water and financial shortages would push towards cheaper and more sustainable solutions but in fact the trend is for more standards and more norms, and decision makers are afraid of new innovative solutions. For example reuse of grey water for agriculture is not permitted (our country produces fodder corn irrigated with sprinklers …) but “treated” sludge can be spread in fields.
In France the civil society has to push hard for sustainable solutions and on the other end, public authorities, the public health sector, water lobbies are all pushing hard the other way … It is not a matter of resources, engineers, laboratories, infrastructure but more a matter of state of mind, sectoral thinking (agriculture, health, sanitation, separated from each other) and sectoral society (academia, business, civil society, separated from each other).

What books or magazines can be found on your bedside table?

Naghib Mahfouz, Khan al-Khalili. Written by an Egyptian writer, it is a novel taking place in one of Cairo’s oldest ward, in middle of the 20th century. I like reading literature related the countries I live in or other countries. It is a very good way and a lot of fun to understand the local culture through the minds of the local characters!

What are your hobbies?

Long distance running, and even better with a multi-cultural group of runners, crazy enough to jog at 6 in the morning between garbage and stray dogs in the streets of Cairo !
I love spending time with my husband and 3 children and doing all kinds of outdoor activities and projects together.

A nice experience or story you would like to share about sanitation...?

I was quite lucky because I sold UD vermicomposting toilets to a friend and then rented the house where the toilets were installed (followed by a straw filter and a constructed wetland). It was very funny to observe everyone’s reaction to the use of the facilities and especially the children.
A couple of them (especially the 2 – 3 years old) did not notice any difference with conventional toilets.
Many of them came to me to say it was so funny to see their “caca” roll down the conveyor belt and the pedal system was very popular amongst children!
My children were touring their friends to the funny toilets, first thing before even playing.
My daughter asked, what is next now? Are you going to invent the waterless tap?
Most of the adults gave a very nice feedback about the use of the toilets and the lack of smell. However it seems that use of a dry toilet is felt a strong experience, when for the children it was no big deal.
And the constructed wetland (for grey water and urine) in our garden thanked us for our daily gifts with beautiful flowers.


If you had super powers, name one thing you would like to change in the sanitation sector?

Behaviors of the P(ee)s (people, politicians, professionals, planners, private sector etc.) !

What kind of research topics are needed in the sanitation field?

In my view technical and practical trainings are needed. Correct pipes, correct slopes (in the good direction !), how to prevent leaks, put proper rubber seals, ensure ventilation, ensure ground infiltration … There are great research being done, but I think a lot more should be done on practical and down to earth training. There are lots of academic skills in sanitation in this world but out of all of us who can repair a leaking toilet? You can have the best planned project with a sanitation value chain but if the ventilation does not work properly, it will deter the users from using the facilities.
Setting Sustainable Development Goals, planning strategies, guidelines for technical systems all of this is well needed but I have the feeling that there is a need for curriculum and training for technicians at state level and not only at project level : plumbers, electricians, construction workers etc.

What’s it like being a mother of three children and working in development / sanitation ?

I think it is a lot of fun for them!

Part 3 to follow next week...

Posted by Elisabeth von Muench and Shobana Srinivasan (intern) for the SuSanA secretariat

The following are a series of interview-type questions that Cécile kindly took the time to answer for us:

Part 1: About Cécile as a person and her work

You registered with SuSanA on 10 Aug 2011 which is only two months after the forum started. What made you register then?
What is your nationality and where are you living right now (and why or where have you lived previously)?
Where and what did you study, and why? What further trainings were important for your career?
Later on I took several trainings online or in the field: Seecon’s training in Sustainable Sanitation and Water Management Training of Trainers (introducing the creation of sswm.info website), a practical training in toilet building (hammering and nailing!) delivered by the wonderful WAND Foundation in the Philippines, UNITAR’s course on Governance in Urban Sanitation, several modules of Loughborough University’s WEDC center, and recently Eawag’s Planning and Design of Sanitation Systems and Technologies.

What were your main employers, work locations or career milestones?

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Sustainable sanitation in France …

In 2011, I decided to go back to France because I had hoped dry toilets would develop strongly due to a change in the legal framework (official recognition of dry toilets, significant use for festivals etc.). Therefore I created my own little company, MAKATI Environment in order to carry on working as a free-lance consultant in France.
During two years I worked hand in hand with Ecodomeo, a French manufacturer of vermicomposting toilets with urine diversion to support their commercial development. The founder of this company, Emmanuel Morin, is also a member of SuSanA forum. My work consisted in marketing the product, participating in green building fairs as seen on the picture, developing the website, writing articles about the product, developing a network of distributors etc…
I really enjoyed that work because I wanted to promote a product I believe is a very good solution for a country like France (high comfort, low maintenance, and positive impact on the environment) but which could also be a very good solution for public toilets in developing countries or in emergency settings (but then it is another story i.e. to make the link between manufacturers in the private sector and humanitarian aid, which is currently starting to be an issue of interest).

There is also something “magical” happening with the earth worms and their ability to transform faeces into compost.

However, it is difficult to reach a large number of customers for several reasons: small production keeps the price of the product relatively high, lack of knowledge of sanitation authorities, lack of flexibility of the legal framework (in many places obligation to install a conventional individual wastewater treatment process to treat urine), etc. There is also a widespread disbelief and negative attitude towards urine separation toilets in France as many people believe that composting toilets are the only solution (so the Ecodomeo toilet which included urine diversion and composting was struggling with those attitudes). Public authorities are not so keen on supporting this kind of sanitation solution partly due to the big conventional sanitation lobbying…


In parallel to this work with Ecodomeo, I undertook consultancies: translations for GIZ and SuSanA (the GIZ newsletter and SuSanA’s newsmail, reports on climate change, faecal waste management in festivals in France, etc.), project evaluations, proposal writing in sanitation for technical assistance companies, studies on climate change, on green buildings (using, earth, straw, wool etc. for construction purpose and energy efficiency) etc.

To be continued in a further post...

Posted by Elisabeth von Muench and Shobana Srinivasan (intern) for the SuSanA secretariat

Dear All,

We have a new featured user for this month... It's Cécile Laborderie!

This is a continuation of our featured users series, where we have so far introduced Kris, Doreen, Florian, Mughal, Chris, Ina and Jonathan (see here: forum.susana.org/forum/categories/145-featured-users )

Cécile is a passionate and dedicated development worker, and has a French nationality. She has worked with several NGOs in many different parts of the world and presently is a free-lance consultant living in Cairo, Egypt.


Cécile has 76 posts in the forum and is in the 22nd position in terms of number of posts. She has 5 Karma points which puts her 35th in the list of karma points. Her SuSanA basket carries 23 likes (forum user statistics can be seen here and here ).

View Cécile's forum profile and her last 20 posts here (you need to log in to view this).

Vermi-composting toilets, constructed wetlands and sanitation in emergencies and disaster relief are key areas of Cecile's work and interest, as you can see in her forum posts.

As an important contributor to our Forum's French threads (formerly in a dedicated category, now integrated with the rest of the threads), Cecile has initiated several topics in French and has been working untiringly in making SuSanA a global forum - bridging the language gap between English and French. She can be sweetly addressed as SuSanA's French ambassador as she also works for the SuSanA secretariat (and other clients) with official translations of documents from English to French, such as the SuSanA's news mail - did you recieve your copy recently in the inbox? If not, see here: www.susana.org/en/news/susana-newsmail/8...s-mail-november-2014 :-)

Her friendly posts and sincere involvement affirms her close connection with the forum.

Get ready for a rendez-vous with Cecile in the Forum in the next week where we will post an interview we did with her in several installments.
Congratulations Cécile, so good to have you with us in the Forum!!


Posted by Elisabeth von Muench and Shobana Srinivasan (intern) for the SuSanA secretariat