About the Practice
Problem Statement:

"According to UNICEF, 2 billion people across the world still do not have basic sanitation facilities such as toilets or latrines. Of these, millions still defecate in the open. Open defecation is a problem because it allows for high-potential of bacteria and viruses being transferred through feces leading to large-scale health problems. The risk has heightened in the current COVID pandemic where families residing in slums are forced to use community toilet facilities or open spaces. Moreover, open defecation also inflicts safety concerns on women, causes distress to the elderly and disabled and poses environmental risks*. Also, the current solutions offered by governments through Community Toilets (CTBs) to address the sanitation problem are not the most effective solutions. Cities look at CTBs as ‘One Glove Fits All’ solutions. They have inadequate toilet seat to person ratio, are unsafe for women, incur high capital costs and have high maintenance costs which very often lead to disrepair and poor maintenance. Despite several parts of India being declared as open defecation free, hygienic sanitation continues to be a problem in the country. The primary target to this problem are the slum settlements which are low-income, high density settlements having low disease immunity and inadequate medical facilities. These settlements form an integral and important part of the city’s economy but are often unaddressed." * https://data.unicef.org/topic/water-and-sanitation/sanitation/

Detail:

"Recognizing the problems posed by open defecation as well as community toilets, Shelter Associates focuses on building household toilets through its ‘One Home One Toilet’ (OHOT) model. There are 3 main components of delivering toilets under the OHOT model". 1. Data and GIS Mapping SA pioneered the use of Geographic Information System (GIS) technology & Google Earth in the late 90’s for spatially mapping poverty. To do this the team conducts infrastructure surveys and household-level surveys in slums using an android application. This data is regularly updated on a web-based platform to allow for real time monitoring on slum-level and city-level spatial maps. The information thus created is finally used to determine the gaps in delivery of sanitation, make the required budgetary provisions and target slum residents with the highest level of vulnerability. Based on the spatial query of data, SA is able to determine families in a community who lack access to a household toilet and are interested in having one. They eventually get identified as potential beneficiaries. 2. Mobilizing Communities The second step is to create awareness and bring about behavioral change related to sanitation in the community. The data and maps help us have contextualized , meaningful discussions with slum residents through community meetings, workshops, activities and focused group discussions with women, children, adolescent girls and boys and men to bring about a behavioural change and thus generate demand for household toilets. 3. Delivering Toilets The last step is the delivery of a household toilet on a cost sharing basis, where the construction material is provided at the doorstep of the beneficiary and the cost of construction is borne by the beneficiaries, bringing in a sense of ownership & pride. This also enables construction of customized toilets tailored to their needs. It is evident that over time, families take pride in this asset and often get their houses upgraded because of their elevated sense of well-being. In fact, about 52.5% of the sample size for our internal impact assessment survey data have been recorded to be either modifying or upgrading their homes incentivized by the household toilets. Thus the model allows for an end-to-end integrated solution from planning through data to behavior change and finally construction of good quality toilets. These processes therefore solve not only the sanitation problems relating to health, safety and environment but also provide a data driven mechanism that supports effective policy implementation and government fund utilization. SA has mapped and surveyed over 293000 slum households and facilitated over 20,000 individual household toilets in 7 cities of Maharashtra impacting over 370000 people directly and indirectly. (Updated August 2020)"


About the Innovator

Knowledge Provider / Innovator: Shelter Associates (SA)
Address: A/17, Sarasnagar Siddhivinayak Society, Shukrawar Peth
City: Pune
State: Maharashtra
PIN Code 411047
Email: pratima@shelter-associates.org
Contact No: 91 9823102949
Website: www.shelter-associates.org

Practice Details

Manufacturing Capacity: The 'One Home One Toilet' is a turn key solution wherein the model is described in the Toolkit generated by Shelter Associates for further replicating and scaling this innovation. The toolkit contains a detailed step by step procedure on the project implementation. Moreover, the slum data generated by Shelter Associates is shared with the Urban Local Bodies who further scale this innovation based on the ready data. Several Municipal Corporations across the cities of Navi Mumbai, Panvel, Pimpri-Chinchwad, Kolhapur and Thane are replicating and scaling SA’s OHOT model in delivery of household sanitation under SBM.
Photo Links:

Problem Scale: The problem is grave due to the above factors and also the present COVID19 situation makes it even more crucial to have home toilet
Blog Link 1:

Blog Link 5:

News Link 5:


GIAN Reference: GIAN/UAL/079
Please login to view or add comments to this practice.