Norms and Attitudes Towards Ecological Sanitation
Ecological sanitation [ecosan] is aimed at closing the nutrient and water cycles in a safe way, while wasting few resources. Nutrients from human excreta are returned to the soil to fertilize crops. A shift towards ecosan needs to take into account the prevailing social contexts and physical environments.
Variations in sanitation and water arrangements
Sanitation arrangements vary in the six periurban settlements that have been assessed in the study*. These six settlements are: Addis Ababa, Ethiopia; Cuernavaca, Mexico;
Kabale, Uganda; Majumba Sita, Tanzania; Manyatta, Kenya; and Stockholm, Sweden.
Characteristics of these arrangements include:
- Access to water – this can vary from indoor tap water to wells and vendors. Most areas face water shortages at least during the dry season or from supply failure.
- Variation in toilet facilities – this can vary from a complete lack of sanitation to full coverage of WCs.
- Wastewater disposal - in most locations wastewater is discharged into nearby ravines or into the ground, and the sewers often leak into the streets. Pit latrines and septic tanks often overflow and/or collapse during the rainy season, causing environmental as well as health problems.
- Reuse of nutrients from human excreta - this can vary from extensive use in situ to no reuse at all.
People’s perception of faeces and urine
Culture, economy, urban/rural population pattern and gender are among the factors influencing how people perceive human excreta and arrangements and devices for managing faeces and urine. Moving to urban centres seems to lead to changes in many views held in rural areas. There is a general view that the odour and appearance of faeces is more repulsive than that of urine. But over time the odour of urine can become worse when the urea in urine converts to noxious ammonia gas. Odour from intestinal gases from others is seen as repulsive, but people tolerate their own odour while actually using a toilet. There seems to be a general societal norm that touching or handling fresh excreta should be avoided. However, babies and sick people in the home need assistance to manage defecation and disposal of fresh excreta. Women are often said to be conditioned to accept this task, and the faeces of babies are considered less offensive than those of adults. This causes unhygienic practices with few or no barriers to the transmission of pathogens, e.g. there appears to be little concern about disposal of the wastewater from washed diapers. Only rarely was it acknowledged that people come into direct contact with their own faeces, and the important issue is how hygiene is maintained.
In most societies it is common to observe the faeces and to a lesser extent the urine to determine a person’s health status; this is even more so for babies. However, at the same time there is an expressed view that faeces should not be seen. This may be linked to folk beliefs that faeces could be used to threaten enemies. However, if the faecal matter is treated by dry storage or composting it then resembles soil or humus, and the avoidance behaviour disappears. People seem to have a more relaxed view on urine, to the extent that it is often used for treatment of minor ailments such as small wounds and as an insecticide to kill banana weevils. In some societies it is recommended to drink small amounts of urine to cure allergic reactions or measles. People perceive cow dung as safe and have little or no reservations to touch it. However, pigs are considered dirty for religious reasons or because of their scavenging habits. Hens and dogs are also scavengers, but only dogs are usually not acceptable as human food.
