Sanitation Safety Plan

• Have some influence over practices that affect wastewater use safety (e.g. farmer
cooperatives)
• Are affected by actions taken in the system to protect water quality (e.g. local community)
or
• Are interested in water quality (e.g. an NGO working with people affected by the system)

Step 2: Description of the sanitation system

A thorough understanding of all parts aids the crucial understanding of the sanitation system and
its performance requirements supports the subsequent risk assessment.

Mapping the system

The system map should follow the path of all fractions of the waste from the point of generation,
at an upstream boundary, to its use or disposal at a downstream boundary. Site visits should be
conducted as a part of this exercise and all subsequent components of this step. The following
checklist of issues should be considered when developing the system map:
• Include all sources of waste – both point and non-point sources such as runoff
• Ensure the fate of all used and disposed parts of the waste stream have been accounted
for
• Identify all significant existing potential barriers (e.g septic tanks)
• Include flow rates where known
• Include capacity for design loading of components where known
• Include drinking water sources where this is relevant to the system or could be affected by
the sanitation system

Characterisation of the waste fractions

An important preparatory step for the hazard identification is the characterisation of waste
fractions. It helps to identify the factors that will affect the system performance, especially if
there are any treatment system. A waste fraction can be identified based on their appearance,
their levels of toxicity, the impact they generate within the system, physical and chemical
characteristics. (WHO guidelines, 2006) It aims to identify all the different fractions of the waste
streams into the sanitation system.
Factors to be considered while characterisation:
• The main composition of the waste in terms of liquid and solid fractions
• The potential for accidentally mixed components of the waste that may pose as a risk
• The likely concentration of physical and chemical pollutants, and pathogenic micro-
organisms of the waste

Identification of potential exposure groups

This aims at categorizing people that may be exposed to a particular hazard. This enables a
further prioritization both for control strategies as well as for potential exposure groups in the risk
assessment process. The broad classifications of exposure groups are: (a) workers, (b) farmers,
(c) local community and (d) consumers.

Gathering compliance and contextual information

Relevant information should be assembled for
• Relevant quality standards, certification and auditing requirements

53 Annexes