Dear Christian,

Thanks for the links. (Vishwanath is planning to tell us more about this at the upcoming SuSanA meeting in Stockholm by the way).

I wonder about these issues:

• Groundwater pollution from these pits and trenches??
• Massive odour (or is that only for a few days until there is a dry crust on top)?
• Needs good fences to prevent children from falling in (at least while it is still wet/muddy).
• How is solid waste removed before applying it as soil conditioner (there is often a lot of solid waste in pits).

To what extent is this a new approach? I have seen things like that in various reports by Sandec who had a big faecal sludge management program around 2003 or so (e.g. Martin Strauss and Doulaye Koné who is now at the Gates Foundation).

Regards,
Elisabeth

Dear all,
I have come across this recent case study on FSM in Bangalore from IRC where honey sucker businesses are collabrating with farmers to dump the faecal sludge on agricultural land on the outskirts of Banaglore in India. The farmers welcome the faecal sludge as a cheap nutrient source. www.irc.nl/page/72840

There are two methods to apply the sludge on the land:

• Faecal sludge from the honey suckers is emptied in a large pit. After the sludge is dried (mostly after three months) it is applied to the crops for instance coconut trees. The water from the sludge either seeps away or evaporates.

• Wet faecal sludge is directly applied to the farm land. This is done either through trenches (for instance in between banana trees) or on vacant farmland that will be farmed later in the season.
One of the interviewed farmers was selling dried faecal sludge to other farmers. For this purpose, he had dug one large additional pit on his land to dry the sludge.

Obvioulsy the farmers do not always pay for this service and if they pay it is only pocket money for the driver. So the source of income for the business are the emptying fees of holding tanks or septic tanks from middle to high income households. This practice has developed outside the legal framework and holds various hygiene risks for farmers and consumers of the product. However it showcases the potential for sludge / human waste reuse in the periphery of towns such as Bangalore.



The sludge treatment and disposal / reuse in open pits and trenches seems to be also part of the official FSM concept in Malaysia (see docs.watsan.net/Downloaded_Files/PDF/AECOM-2010-Rapid.pdf) and utilised in South Africa for sludge management - David Stil httphttp://www.susana.org/images/documents/04-meetings/side-events/2011-kigali/SEI-side-event/en-susana-side-africasan3-still.pdf

Does anybody have more examples on the practical implementation and use of trenches and open pits for FSM?

Regards,
Christian