Excreta disposal

Aim: To give an overview of excreta

control and disposal methods, their
development and management
Sanitation integrated with water & health education

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Health Education

•Safe disposal of faeces with an important emphasis on young children can

reduce diarrhoea by 36% or more.
•Hand-washing with soap can reduce diarrhoeal disease by 35% or more and
can also reduce the prevalence of eye infections.
•The protection of water from faecal contamination will reduce diarrhoeal
infections (particularly the water born infections) by 20%.
 (Source Esry et al., 1990)
 What do we expect from a latrine?
1. Isolate human excreta from health environment
2. Culturally acceptable
3. Rapid construction
4. Maintainable & Easy to clean
5. Safety & protection to women, children and
special group.
6. Fly/mosquito/(odour) control
7. Meet specially able people's needs e.g.
disabled, children, etc.
Programme & planning factors

• Context-refugee/IDP flow & numbers,

timing, area & location
• Design factors, approaches and phases
• Environmental conditions, technical
feasibility
• Materials, logistics and costs
• Funding,
• Human resources
Design factors
1. Socio-cultural, practice & belief
2. Available space and ground conditions
3. Water availability, quantity and usage
4. Anal cleansing materials & practice
5. Menstruation period sanitary practice
6. User friendliness (to children, disable, etc)
7. Time constraint, seasons
8. Design life, accumulation rate, pit depth
9. Agency mandate, regional & local focus
10. Financial constraints, donor interest,
11. Local materials, skills, etc.
12. Logistics/transportation
13. Human resources
14. Exit strategy
Cultural factors
•Disposal of bodily waste is a very
private function in most cultures and
may be subject to a range of taboos,
religious and social rules, and
restrictions.
•Your sanitation planning needs to take
account of these.
 Fear factor

Women were reluctant to use

Latrine made of semi-
transparent plastic sheet at
Afghan refugee camp in
Pakistan

Fear of falling down or

stepping in to the latrine pit
deter people especially children
from using latrine
Design to suit local materials & skills

Use of local materials in

traditional way encourage
participation

Participation creates
ownership and uphold
dignity
Excreta Control and disposal methods
• Clean up programme
• Open defecation-controlled, cat method and intensive on
rocky ground, “let it dry”.
• Shallow trench defecation field
• Trench latrines (privacy screen* + lined & unlined)
• Pit latrines (Communal & family)
• VIP latrines (Communal & family)
• Other latrines-including latrine in difficult environments
• Other methods-bag & contain, containment, bore, etc
• Latrine systems, e.g. small bore sewerage, connection to
existing sewage main, Treatment plants, etc. (urban
camps)
Flowchart for sanitation in refugee camp
Immediate response
Emergency clean up

• Mobilisation-labour, volunteer, often in

huge number- 1 day followed by controlled
options.
• Faeces can be cover with lime powder
prior to remove
• Need cleaning tools and protective
clothing
• Safe dumping hole or designated area
Controlled open defecation field (ODF)
See EIE-p162
• Far from water facilities
• Downhill of settlement
and water sources
• Far from public building,
roads & dwelling
• No field crops grown for
human consumption
• Far from food storage or
preparation area
• Approximate 0.25 m2 pppd
Intensive defecation field
On a hard rock ground, define the
area, create a sand topping of 5-7cm,
apply same rule as ODF, keep heap
of sand at the entrance.
User will take shovel scope of sand
to cover the faeces and to remove
with sand and dispose in the
dumping bin provided.

•Rapid and cheap to implement but

•Lacks privacy-needs space and full time care & maintenance
 Shallow trench defecation field

Simple improvement on open defecation field- by limited privacy and covering faeces with dugout soil.
Simple Trench Latrine
PortaLoo
Latrine kits

Oxfam latrine kits are

useful for rapid
deployment to start
with in a rapid onset
emergency situation
or
where local materials
are not available
 Emergency pit latrine-
pre-arrival camp

Temporary latrine for

flood displaced camp in
Assam
Communal latrines
•Sitting & distribution
•Participation
•Maintenance
•Life, replacement
 Family latrines
• Participation
• Space
• Shared family
• Responsibility
• Tools and materials
• Maintenance
Logistics & resource management
Success to large scale latrine
construction programme depends on
planning, management and resource
mobilisation with speed & accuracy
accurate design & cost estimate speed up management support !
Bill of materials-example
Latrines in difficult environment
• Latrines in high water table or in flood
situation.
• Latrines on rocky ground/hard soil
• Limited space-dewatering/desludging
• Overcrowded public buildings-domestic
containment
 Latrine in high water table

European refugee!!
Raised latrine-hard rock or flooding
situation
Desludging
Wattle fortified with mud plaster
Good practices
Trench latrine in Albania camp
Bad practice
Pre-fabricated latrines
Latrine in
flood
•Flowing water
with cubicle
•Solid waste &
excreta
containment

Flood
water
Built up plinth
Ground level
Built up plinth
Ground level
Built up plinth
Ground level