26 Sanitation and Cleanliness for a Healthy Environment
Community sanitation in Yoff, Senegal
Not long ago, Yoff was a typical West African fishing village outside of Dakar,
the capital city of Senegal. Families lived in compounds connected by walking
paths and open spaces. But as Dakar grew and swallowed Yoff, it became part
of a large urban area with an international airport and a lot of car traffic.
As the town grew, many houses installed flush toilets connected to tanks
to collect the sewage. When the tanks filled up, people pumped them out into
open pits where the sewage sat and bred disease. Other people who were too
poor to afford toilets used open sandy areas to fulfill their needs. But with
many people living close together, this quickly became a health problem.
A town development committee came together to solve these problems.
They began by looking at the resources they had: strong community networks,
skilled builders, and people committed to keeping village life. They also had
some new ideas about ecological sanitation.
In the village, houses were grouped around open common areas where
people could gather and talk. After talking to many villagers, the committee
made a plan to use this open area for a sanitation system that would make the
area more attractive, rather than uglier. Instead of promoting household toilets
and underground sewage tanks, they would promote community ecological
sanitation.
The committee worked with residents to build urine-diverting dry toilets.
Each set of toilets would be shared by the whole compound. The urine would
run through pipes into beds of reeds. The feces, after being dried out, would
be used to fertilize trees. All of this would help to keep the
village green. Local masons and builders
were hired to construct the
toilets and to maintain the
common areas.
This urban sanitation
project not only prevented
health problems – it helped
to preserve the way the
people of Yoff wanted to
live.
Creative solutions for healthier cities
Urban sanitation does not have to use large water-based systems. In fact, in most of
the world, large water-based systems cause more problems than they solve. Water-
based sanitation systems produce large amounts of dirty water that must be treated
before it can be reused. If it is not purified – and it usually is not – this leads to serious
environmental and health problems.
If urban sanitation services are combined with urban farming, parks, garbage
collection, and energy production, cities can become healthier and more beautiful
places to live. When community groups work with local governments to come up with
creative solutions, the result will be greener, healthier cities.