Pit latrine toilet being promoted in India, gets global funding

This comes as a major boost for Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s aim to achieve the goal of an open defecation-free country by 2019. The Water Innovation Engine, a partnership led by the Australian government’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, on Thursday launched the global Urban Sanitation Challenge with the announcement of a multimillion dollar investment in five projects. 

The projects include an innovative line of affordable plastic toilets equipped with a simple, gravity-powered self-closing trapdoor that makes pit latrine outhouses safer, more sanitary and less unpleasant. The five projects in Africa, Asia, and South America will be scaled up with a total investment of CAD8.7 million. 

The products, marketed under the SATO brand of Japan’s LIXIL Group Corporation, are now being used in 14 countries, with more than 1.2 million toilets installed, improving the lives of six million people. With the new funding, production will be scaled up to reach 15 mn additional users. 

Across its global sanitation and hygiene activities, LIXIL aims to provide safe sanitation for 100 million additional people worldwide by the end of 2020 – a four percent reduction in the 2.3 billion worldwide who lack access to basic sanitation. That would represent a significant acceleration of the world’s pace towards a key United Nations Sustainable Development Goal for 2030: Sanitation for all. 

In 2015, 2.3 billion people still lacked even a basic sanitation service, and 892 million people still practiced open defecation. With SATO toilet products now also available in Uganda, Kenya and India, LIXIL is establishing new manufacturing sites and distribution in Nigeria, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Rwanda, South Africa, Vietnam, Indonesia, Haiti, Ghana, Malawi and the Philippines. The products include a variety of models tailored to meet local needs and preferences.