The Hindu : New Delhi News : African countries want to go the Sulabh way

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Friday, Feb 11, 2005

New Delhi

New Delhi

African countries want to go the Sulabh way

By Our Staff Reporter

NEW DELHI, FEB. 10. Delegates from five African countries -- Ethiopia, Mozambique, Uganda, Cameroon and Burkina Faso -- expressed their desire to adopt Indian techniques to improve sanitation facilities in their towns and villages at an International Workshop on Sanitation Technologies organised by Sulabh International Academy of Environmental Sanitation here.

As many as 23 sanitation experts from these five African countries were trained on Sulabh sanitation technologies participated in the 12-day meet, which was also a step towards strengthening and promoting South-South Cooperation for sharing experiences and exchanging ideas on appropriate technologies.

The workshop had been organised by Sulabh in collaboration with United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-HABITAT) as part of the implementation of the Habitat Agenda for achieving the millennium goals for sustainable development in water, sanitation and hygiene.

During the workshop, the Ambassador of Ethiopia, Teketel Forsedo, highlighted the need for technology transfer for the common good of the people of India and Africa and also stressed the importance of improving sanitation facilities for ensuring better health and living condition to the masses.

In his address, the chancellor of Sulabh, Bindeshwar Pathak, spoke about the affordability of Sulabh technologies and said they can be replicated with modifications to suit the local conditions in African countries. Stating that the western nations do not use the compost system because human waste does not decompose in cold climate, he said but in tropical countries Sulabh's eco-friendly, twin-pit, pour-flush, compost technology is ideal.

The Joint Secretary in the Ministry of Urban Development and Poverty Alleviation, Pankaj Jain, said this was the first time that the UN has involved a non-governmental organisation in its global efforts to promote inter-state cooperation on sanitation, especially with the developing countries to achieve the millennium goal.

Incidentally, it is at the request of the UN-Habitat, that the capacity building process is being carried out in three phases in which Sulabh -- which has also been working in South Asia including Afghanistan and has sent experts to several countries as UN-Habitat missions -- is training the professionals from African countries. After this, the African participants will take up project planning and implementation of sanitation projects in their own countries under the technical and administrative supervision of the Indian NGO.

This would be a move towards meeting the sanitation target by the Johannesburg Declaration of securing Sanitation for All by 2015.

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