Human Settlements Review - Parliamentary Monitoring Group

Human Settlements Review, Volume 1, Number 1, 2010
at the HRDC. The Village Council of Aranos
resettled 800 families to a new area in 2005.
One problem was the provision of sanitation
facilities. Representatives visited the HRDC
several times to obtain information on the
various systems. In 2006 Council requested
a meeting in Aranos with the community to
address the options available. The HRDC
explained some options by means of lightweight
plastic toilets and pictures. After explaining the
options, community members stated that they
could build one of the options – the Otji-toilet.
The latter was designed and is constructed by
the Clay House Project in Otjiwarongo. With
the help of a project grant to promote these
dry systems, where the local authority has to
contribute 560 bricks and accommodation for
one week to the training team, two units were
build shortly after. In the following years the
local authority employed these trained builders
to construct additional toilets.
A project in northern Namibia intended to
construct a building to house the offices of
a community forestry programme. It was
proposed to use clay as main building material.
However, officials in Windhoek were critical.
The clay house at the HRDC convinced them
that the material was not inferior. The project
was approved and the offices plus two Otjitoilets
and a shop, to sell local handicraft,
were constructed. With the support of the
Clay House Project the office and toilets were
constructed.
Education and advocacy includes cooperation
with network partners in the private sector,
local authorities, and organizations, such as
the Shack Dwellers Federation of Namibia
and the Clay House Project. Another activity is
lecturing at educational institutions inside the
country, but also on international level.
Education is of utmost importance if new
concepts and their related technologies are
advocated, for example, EcoSan. Avvannavar
and Mani (2008:5) explain the reasons:
“Two sets of people can be classified
based on the nature of association
with nature in terms of handling human
excreta. The first include the faecophilic,
who consider human excreta as a part
of a natural cycle and have evolved
suitable mechanisms. The second
include the faecophobic, who consider
human excreta something to ‘stay away’
from and their sanitation approach
reflects such a fear”.
Avvannavar and Mani point out that, a
faecophilic believes that soil can take good
care of human excreta by decomposition. If
properly buried in hot-dry climates the faecal
matter does not carry a bad odour, which is in
line with modern findings that burial of excreta
breaks the faecal-oral transmission and is
nearly 100% safe mechanism of handling
the need to construct latrines (Waterkeyn
& Cairncross quoted by Avvannavar &
Mani 2008:5). In predominantly agricultural
countries, the practice to defecate in the fields
returns human excreta to the soil. Winblad
and Kalima (quoted by Avvannavar & Mani
2008:5) point out that, “Societies that have
traditionally used excreta in agriculture (and
even aquaculture) for thousands of years have
been predominantly found to be high-density
settlements in countries like India, China
and South-East Asia”. Jenkins (2005:125)
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