Sustainable urban sanitation – moving forward

This thematic discussion focuses on how to move towards more sustainable urban sanitation. The discussions will be organised around two areas: 1) addressing the entire sanitation chain and the need to embrace systemic change; and 2) the role (or lack of) of local governments and its leaders to drive the required change.

Week 1, topic 1:

Holistic Comprehensive Systemic Change or Piecemeal Solutions?

The guiding questions for this week’s topic are:

1. What are your views on using the systemic change approach for addressing the (urban) sanitation challenges?
2. Is it justifiable to continue focusing on onsite containment of human faeces and thereby ignoring all the other links of the sanitation chain?
3. How can we balance the need for systemic long-time change with addressing some of the immediate urgent needs?

Background

In a world where the urbanisation rate is increasing, many more organisations are redirecting their attention and energy towards improving sanitation and hygiene conditions in urban areas. This may not be a bad idea considering the huge problems at hand. Consider for example that right now some 700 million urban dwellers worldwide still lack access to improved sanitation (1). These numbers hide the fact that the current JMP definition for improved sanitation (a facility which hygienically separates human excreta from human contact) does not address the subsequent management of faecal waste. This means that the health risks and environmental burden associated with unsafely managed faecal matter are still there.

The problem is complex and there are no simple solutions

Urban sanitation is a complex challenge. Factors contributing to these challenges are numerous and varied. For example, weak government leadership, lack of institutional clarity, limited capacities of public officials and other sector actors, limited public financing with increased inequality as a result, weak policy and regulatory framework and lack of enforcement of norms and standards, inadequate containment by onsite systems resulting in toilets discharging in drains or open water bodies, lack of adequately services to safely remove, transport, treat and dispose or reuse human waste resulting in indiscriminate dumping of human waste, etc.

Is it therefore enough to focus only on one or two elements of this complex system or do we need to come up with solutions for all the non-functioning elements in the chain?

Systemic change versus piece meal solutions

In a recent blog ‘But what is it that you actually do?’ IRC’s CEO Patrick Moriarty explains what has to change to ensure that everyone, everywhere will be able to enjoy access to water, sanitation and hygiene services that last forever. The blog includes a slide deck that provides a simple visualisation of what is required to achieve universal and sustained services by focusing on changing the entire system. Patrick’s blog can be accessed at http://www.ircwash.org/blog/but-what-is-it-that-you-actually-do

What are we talking about? Systemic change is change that encompasses all parts of a system, taking into account the interrelationships and interdependencies among those parts whereas piecemeal change focuses on one or several parts of a system and thereby addresses only pieces of the urban sanitation problem.

Systemic change means that we need to 1) improve (sanitation) conditions in an entire geographic or administrative area (e.g. municipality) and not in one or two small pockets (e.g. slums), 2) assess and address all the relevant (weak) parts by considering all parts of a system, 3) involve and work with all the stakeholders, and 4) be consciously systematic in what we do. The figure below provides a simple framework which includes most if not all the elements of this system thinking.


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The earlier mentioned slide deck in Patrick's blog shows that it may take up to ten years to work painstakingly through the different phases to achieve systemic change. Do we have that much time? A more detailed overview of the different phases is provided on page 24 of the following paper http://www.ircwash.org/resources/towards-systemic-change-urban-sanitation

(1) This figure of 700 million is estimated on the basis of the information provided in the latest JMP

Hi Cor

Thank you for launching this discussion!

First a comment on the Figure: I am missing the "containment", "collection" and the "transportation" (lower left edge in the red circle).
Even though these elements are only a part of the sanitation chain, they are crucial to have control on that part in order to guide how the disposal/reuse can or cannot take place.

To react on your guiding questions:

First, I do agree that a for a strategic planning level, a systematic view and planning approach is required in order to support more integrated and potentially more sustainable sanitation plans.

But:

• Systematic approaches to my experience are often larger projects and it is difficult, to implement such approaches incremental. Thus the institutional arrangements need to be prepared for a systematic planning allowing for cross-sectoral dialogue and providing human and financial resources to follow such a rather "heavy" projects.
• As broached above, change has to take place simultaneously at different level from the individual to the organisation and it is not easy to break down systematic approaches to the impact level of an individual. Thus, this might also leads to a piecemeal solutions even though initially not thought as such.
• As much as a systematic approach have to be brought down to the individual level within an organisation (assuming it has been taken up by at the organisational level) it has also to be linked to the communities in order to ensure participation of all stakeholders and ownership and uptake. That means, systematic approaches need to be flexible enough to adapte to different needs of communities overs space and time.

Cheers, Dorothee

Sanitation problem is huge and thou we need systematic approach it needs to be flexible as per the demand of the community.The roles of different stakeholder also keep changing and need which need to be modified.But finally a good leadership who can create a revolution within the existing system.

Personally, we need to act promptly on this, but it has to be done properly so we have to take as much time as we need.

We are working on our trial inner city sanitation (ICS) system and have circa 4,000 people within two catchment areas of Cuddalore and Pondicherry in India. The plan is to move into 'proper' slums in the next phase. The reason we opted for slums is because the need is greatest with the poorest people; it is like working from the bottom of the chain upwards. We have worked closely with Chennai City Council for this next stage and collected data from the three broad areas in which they want us to work. I have mentioned previously the results of our initial baseline survey in the current areas. They would be quite significant if we can replicate them in Chennai.

If you want to see a very broad overview you can look here, but it is in need of updating: www.sanitationfirst.org

I think systematic is great, and it is important to engage the relevant authorities from stage one, but we need to start somewhere and to try and solve everything from day one could be very daunting. The scale of the problem is so large.

Thanks for organising this discussion and the interesting opening/ introduction.
I fully agree with the fact that systemic change is needed to fully solve the issues. However, I don't think it is realistic to get such programmes off the ground as "a systemic whole" due to the way things work in practice: planning cycles, budgets, limitations to the number of organisations you can work with efficiently etc. You will need to break things into managable pieces of work and it should be possible to prioritise where to start. A crucial factor is that there is a common view on what the final situation should look like (in big strokes! leaving flexibility on details). I see it as a big, complicated jigsaw puzzle that will only be fully solved if all pieces fall into place, but it is possible for different actors to work at different parts of the puzzle at the same time OR at different times. But that requires a clear VISION (from (local) government?) of what to work towards, so all will be working on the same big puzzle and you won't get a lot of unfinished, different puzzles at the end. So this vision and the leadership for others to buy into/ stick to that vision is the key and often missing.

Thank you for launching such an interesting discussion....a subject very close to my heart. I think adopting a Systemic change approach is the way to go especially if we want to improve the health outcomes of the majority of the people especially in Africa. It is now widely acknowledged that just focussing on the toilet will not bring lasting solutions to the sanitation crisis. Study by UNC Water Institute (2013) and WSP (2014) underscores the need to redefine the way sanitation is approached. Firstly considering that quite a number of improved sanitation facilities are inadequate as they release untreated wastewater and facaecal sludge into the environment, it is crucial that these other parts of the sanitation chain (e.g transport,treatemt) are also investigated and proper policies put in place to ensure that they perform functionally. it must be recognized however that the problem is complex and challenging because for example some countries in Africa which have water-borne sewerage systems adopted these during the colonial era and because of their economic situation among other factors they have failed to maintain or upgrade the existing infrastructure and thus have fallen into disrepair. Secondly, a look at some of the Sub-Saharan countries which have made some good progress in improving sanitation coverage, have high prevalence of diarrhoeal diseases largely attributed to poor sanitation. This means even though sanitation coverage maybe high, the sanitation is not adequate as the other parts of the sanitation chain are ignored. Piecemeal solutions therefore do not work.

Dear contributors many thanks for your valuable contributions to this discussion.

What I read between the lines and something I fully agree with is the fact that resolving the urban sanitation challenge(s) is a daunting task. Something that is not resolved over night but unless we start tackling it whole heartedly not much is likely to change drastically for the urban citizens all over world. If we would have had all the answers then there would have been no need for this e-debate on the SuSanA forum. I am therefore happy to see that the discussion has started as it will help (all of) us to better frame our mind.

Let me try to react to some of the reactions brought up so far.

Dorothee Spuhler mentioned that she was missing part of the links of the sanitation chain (e.g. containment, collection and transportation) in the figure provided in the introductory text. We should have mentioned in the text that the figure is still work in progress and I hope that we will be able to improve it on the basis of this and other discussions. I do agree that the figure is not clear and not complete. The red inner circle called "sustainable service delivery" is the interface between the service providers and users. All the services relevant to assure that the urban population have access to and use sustainable and environmentally safe sanitation facilities (or services) should be captured in this circle. That includes all the different links of the sanitation chain from containment all the way to safe disposal and or safe reuse but also interventions necessary to change the behaviour and practices of the population (through HP and or BCC interventions). More needs to be done to better capture all these elements in the figure.

Is systemic change (some call it systematic approaches) possible? The first four reactions basically agree that it will be difficult and may be not realistic "to get such programmes of the ground". "Trying to solve everything from day one could be very daunting as the scale of the problem is so large." I would tend to agree with these observations if indeed we would want to change the whole world in one 'project'. That is indeed not realistic but that is also not what we were thinking of. Simply said systemic change means that you need to look at and address all the weak elements or links within a system but not necessarily all at once. In IRC's theory of change we would break up the entire process in three 'manageable' phases where the first phase "Initiating the change" is may be the most crucial with the following four interconnected elements:
- Managing partnerships and building trust;
- Carrying out a rapid assessment;
- Building consensus around a shared vision; and
- Developing a comprehensive city-level sanitation strategy and plan

The actual implementation of the city sanitation strategy through phase 2 "Learning and testing"and phase 3 "Replicating and scaling" could then be carried out incrementally and could possibly even include piecemeal solutions as long as they fit within the shared vision for the desired end situation. However there could possibly be challenges that need to addressed at scale, for example improving faecal sludge management services and practices may need to be carried out city-wide to create economies of scale for potential commercial businesses.

Dear all,

Thank you for this interesting discussion; thanks to those who took this up and to all those reacting so far.

My two cents:
If we are to talk about 'systemic change' rather than 'piecemeal solutions', I think we should move away from the idea of 'projects'. I know that this is difficult as we all depend on project money and time-lines. In fact, most people me included, are unable to move beyond this mindset, call it a paradigm if you want. I just came back from a city in Northwest Congo where I have seen how this project-based thinking can be dominating all processes within a society, from politics to churches and small local NOGs. Sad enough, everybody is consciously caught in this trap of moving from one project to the next without any change being realised.

What we need to realise is that urban sanitation is not the problem of those working in NGOs, consultancy companies etc. We are only there to facilitate. Urban sanitation is, or should be, the problem of the local political-administrative authorities (city councils, ULBs (urban local bodies) etc.). This is an ongoing responsibility, not a concern related to project funds, expertise and time-frames. External facilitation can certainly help, but these should not be the 'drivers' of this process.

What does this mean? (names are not intended as personal attacks)
Well for one, I don't agree with Alan's view. I'm sure you're doing a fantastic project, but sanitation is an issue for the entire city. If one puts the focus on slums only, it becomes reduced to a 'poverty' issue; most likely leading to less interest amongst wealthier citizens. I think it would be better to have an urban masterplan, with different approaches for different neighbourhoods. I realise that this is an enormous challenge and that it is tempting to improve directly the situation for those living in the slums, but such an approach will never be ongoing without external support.

Second, and this is also a reaction Dorothee, the challenge is to see systemic change not just as a 'larger project', but as different way of working. Of course, this leads to the problem of how to implement this within existing funding timeframes, electoral calenders etc. It also indeed means working with the existing institutions, organisations and communities; this is indeed challenging as it can lead to fragmentation. In fact, the challenge is to change what is actually 'being done', while changing 'how we do it' and en passant also changing our own organisations and institutions (international actors very much included here).

Frankly, this seems like a far-fetched dream more than a plan. However, as Erick mentioned such a process can be broken down in different phases. Establishing a vision and clearly moving away from fragmented project-based interventions is a first step. I've seen in DRC how difficult this can be if the political-economic incentives are all aligned to keep this mentality ongoing.

Cheers,
Giacomo

Giacomo said in the post above:

Well for one, I don't agree with Alan's view. I'm sure you're doing a fantastic project, but sanitation is an issue for the entire city. If one puts the focus on slums only, it becomes reduced to a 'poverty' issue; most likely leading to less interest amongst wealthier citizens. I think it would be better to have an urban masterplan, with different approaches for different neighbourhoods. I realise that this is an enormous challenge and that it is tempting to improve directly the situation for those living in the slums, but such an approach will never be ongoing without external support.

And I don't take it personally. But find the city that joins up the dots and works as a cohesive whole. At present we are in the process of proving to the Corporation that the system works. Once that is done then you can start thinking about city-wide schemes. This is not a solution that WE will solve, but we can show corporations and municipalities the basic model and let them scale up. However, in order to do that you have to show a working, sustainable and, likely, a profit making system. This can only be done in a small way before scaling up.

This message is intended to all of you that are interested in the urban sanitation dialogue but who may not have the time so far to contribute to the ongoing discussion.

The debate on urban sanitation has unfortunately not been that lively to date. Knowing how busy we all are in getting our own job done and the fact that we were somewhat late in informing you about this debate, we would like to invite all of you to continue this e-debate during the coming week concurrently with the discussion on the second topic dealing with government leadership.

Wishing you all the very best and looking forward to your contributions.

Erick Baetings
IRC | Senior Sanitation Specialist
Also on behalf of Marielle Snel and Cor van Dietvorst

Great discussion started!

The term 'holistic' is a visionary one but it often shows lack of operational level understanding. People like to see immediate visibility and benefits.

The debate of holistic or piecemeal solution: Even in the diagram presented in the discussion, we see so many different phases and layers of activities involving multiple stakeholders. What we are referring here as piecemeal is actually micro-demonstration, leading to a implementation of a micro-module which may later lead to a holistic solution the duration of which may take, as the research shows, upto 10 years that again, in my understanding, coming from a developing economy, is optimistic!

Programme Context: We are part of a SNV-managed FSM programme in three southern cities in Bangladesh. At the beginning of the programme, we were happier to include a clause on the importance and implementation of FSM in national water and sanitation policy. Holistically perhaps a great achievement. Challenges came when we started interacting with the local authorities. We had to deal with the classic problem of addressing the capacity issues of those municipalities. Municipalities are run by elected representatives who now have to see the FSM issue as one of the top priorities putting them sometimes even ahead of city garbage collection - a greater compelling problem in the daily city life than discharge of fecal waste that finds it ways through storm-drains, water-bodies and canals escaping most our attention. And then how soon we can convince the local authorities and leaders (elected by the people who are living cheap / afford to support other necessities at the cost of health and environment) to introduce taxes and charges to the people at once to take care of the chain-wide FSM.

Market Solution vs. Holistic Approach: If we believe in market, we need to believe in research and evidence. When we use the term holistic, much of it indicates planning, interestingly someone has already said, rather a dream. For our working solution, its great that we came up with different phases of the FSM value chain: containment (which needs to be upgraded), collection and transportation (price of services to be readjusted), processing (construction of treatment plant is costly and funding and operation is an issue) and then disposal and reuse. Our programme reality is that we are working in every phases simultaneously but with different speed. When we look at the containment - we feel time needed to fix the containment will be the longest. However, we are working there more on awareness level. But in the area of sludge collection and transportation we are able to make greater and longer bold step - developing business models to encourage small entrepreneurs. Now when we see the possibility of city-dwellers paying a more realistic price for sludge-emptying, we realize that its about time to start full-fledged treatment plant when we can cover the O&M expenses by taxing the households and institutions even more.

Thus I clearly see that carefully designed chosen a number of piecemeal solutions can contribute to the solution to the chain wide FSM.

Dear all,
Interesting reading and reflections… Clearly there are astronomical WASH challenges especially in the mega cities around the world in terms of coping with their sanitation issues. We, at IRC, believe that to ensure sustainable sanitation for all, there is a need to look at sanitation beyond simply the interventions or programs. Unfortunately today we still see too many one/two dimensional projects focusing on sanitation (e.g. just the collection, transportation, etc stage), let alone reflecting on the systematic change approach. Our, as well as my own, argument is that only through a whole systemic change approach will we seriously be able to address the sanitation challenges and thereby have a more potential likelihood for success. Currently, efforts have to a large extent been targeted at providing simply access to a basic sanitation facility, which is a necessary starting point, but not focusing on the whole sanitation delivery chain picture. On this first point, I would actually really like to get some pragmatic examples for colleagues, especially those in the south, who have possibly done some work on the whole systemaic change approach (or some form of it) and reflect with us on how this worked (or not) and why.
My second concern/issue is that there is an (or what seems like) everlasting fragmentation in partnerships to deal with the systemic change approach for addressing the sanitation challenges. By this I mean fragmentation of different partners and therefore systems in place. As a result WASH partners are not truly working together in a more harmonious manner towards creating sustainable sanitation services that last. My question here is how at the most basic/pragmatic level can we start to overcome? Would love to hear from some of the colleagues on this issue too.