Sanitation Planning Research Articles

Social participation in water and sanitation planning in the city of Belem, State of Para, Brazil, between 1980 and 2015(in Portuguese).

Social participation in water and sanitation planning in the city of Belem, State of Para, Brazil, between 1980 and 2015(in Portuguese).

Linking national policies to beneficiaries: Geospatial and statistical focus to waste and sanitation planning

National policies for waste management that are geared towards achieving sustainable development goals often require plans and implementation strategies developed from empirical and data-driven processes. Developing countries often propose national policies but they never reach the implementation phase and adhoc practices remain unchanged. This paper analyses the strengths and weaknesses of a national waste management policy and develops potential recommendations to address the main threats that hinder the policy implementation. The lack of effective planning using data and analytical tools are identified as the main area hindering the policy implementation. Several applications are demonstrated for waste management using geospatial techniques and statistical modelling. Examples are demonstrated where spatial maps are used for zonation and landfill locations, statistical models used to identify waste generation at the community level and artificial intelligence used for waste separation. Recommendations are proposed in applying several of the methods demonstrated to shift the operation of a national waste sector to realize the benefits of the policy nexus for all stakeholders.

Adapting Santiago Method to Determine Appropriate and Resource Efficient Sanitation Systems for an Urban Settlement in Lima Peru

The pre-selection of locally appropriate sanitation technologies and systems is crucial for strategic sanitation planning as any decision is only as good as the options presented. One approach that allows us to systematically consider the local conditions and a diverse range of conventional and novel technologies and systems is the Santiago method. In this paper, we discuss whether the Santiago method can be applied to the case of Latin America and what we would gain from this application. We do so by expanding the Santiago technology library with technologies that have been shown to be promising in metropolitan areas of Latin America, such as condominial sewer, container-based sanitation, and activated sludge. We then apply Santiago to the semi-informal settlement Quebrada Verde (QV) in Lima, Peru. Using Santiago, we were able to generate 265,185 sanitation system options from 42 technologies and 18 appropriateness criteria. A set of 17 appropriate and divers are then selected. The diversity is defined by 17 system templates. To further evaluate these 17 systems, resource recovery and loss potentials are quantified. Higher nutrients (nitrogen and phosphorus) and total solids recovery are observed for systems that combine urine diversion and biofuel production. The case of QV shows that the Santiago method is applicable in the Latin American context.

Perfil operacional das concessões de serviços de abastecimento de água em três municípios do Sudeste do Pará

A realidade das ações de implementação da universalização e de atendimento aos princípios fundamentais do saneamento básico não são iguais entre os municípios do país. Essa situação é evidenciada ao compararmos os indicadores dos serviços de abastecimento de água, disponíveis no Sistema Nacional de Informações Sobre o Saneamento Básico – SNIS. Ao fazer a comparação da quantidade de ligações, do consumo de água e, do volume de investimentos nas cidades de Redenção, Xinguara e Santana do Araguaia, todos, municípios da microrregião sudeste do Pará, foram encontrados diferentes cenários de universalização, os quais não alcançam o limite máximo estabelecido pela Lei 11.445/2007 e pelo Plano de Saneamento Básico Integrado do Estado do Pará. Assim, a análise, por indicadores, revelou um comportamento de preferência na prestação dos serviços àquelas cidades que apresentaram os melhores indicadores econômicos e de infraestrutura urbana.

Abstract P303: Research Process Development Mitigates Effect of COVID-19 on Stroke Trial Enrollment

Introduction: With hundreds of thousands of clinical trial patients enrolled yearly, the COVID-19 pandemic caused a significant, unexpected disruption in clinical trials across the world. US data showed a 70% enrollment reduction in April and a 38% reduction in July 2020, compared to pre-pandemic rates. We implemented processes during the initial phase of the pandemic to minimize participant and staff viral exposure, develop remote procedures, and ease communication barriers, while still maintaining enrollment goals. Methods: Our stroke research team developed multiple processes to help mitigate pandemic effects on our enrollment. We developed watchlists for eligible and interested patients who could not be enrolled due to national and local restrictions. As research staff was unable to approach patients in person, phone and email scripts were developed to ensure information was disseminated in a consistent fashion. Remote and alternate consent methods were implemented. We tracked the evolving national and local guideline changes, and began re-opening trials on May 23, 2020. We implemented a rotating pool of coordinators, including a site-specific sanitation plan, once it was safe to be on campus in-person. In person meetings were moved to a virtual platform. Enrollment data across for 10 active subacute stroke studies, each active over the 3 years of, 2018-2020, was analyzed for the months from March to June, with 2020 individually compared to 2018 and 2019 via the Student T-Test. Results: Total enrollment during these 4 months were 15 participants in 2018, 11 in 2019, and 15 in 2020, with no statistical difference between the years. No study patients nor staff contracted symptoms of COVID-19. Conclusion: Enrollment shows no significant changes despite COVID-19. New processes allowed the timely reopening of clinical trials, an overall maintenance of enrollment rates, including a non-significant increase in 2020 compared to previous years. Our telehealth and virtual communication focused processes prioritize the safety of patients and staff while ensuring quality control and appropriate enrollment numbers.

Еволюція законодавства про банкрутство в Україні

The article is aimed at defining the main changes in the bankruptcy legislation in Ukraine, as well as the stages of evolution of the bankruptcy institute. The dynamics of bankruptcies of enterprises is considered, stages of evolution of the bankruptcy institute in Ukraine are systematized. Despite the small number of real bankruptcies so far, this problem in the context of quarantine measures is very significant and requires sufficient attention, since mass bankruptcies have an immoderate impact on the country’s economy. As a result of the study, the main changes in the legislation of Ukraine on bankruptcy procedures are determined. These are the criteria for opening a debtor’s bankruptcy procedure; approach to establishing and paying monetary remuneration of the insolvency receiver; term of sanitation; deadline for filing an application by the creditor for debt repayment after publication about opening a bankruptcy procedure; norm on limiting the participation of interested parties in voting at a meeting of creditors when approving a sanitation plan; term for filing an application by the creditor for the repayment of debt after publication about opening a bankruptcy procedure, as well as the possibility of bankruptcy of an individual – not a business entity. The new Code of Ukraine on Bankruptcy Procedures has enacted a set of innovations designed to improve the State regulation of the process of rehabilitation of potentially capable enterprises through their sanitation or reorganization, as well as to simplify the liquidation procedure for those enterprises whose opportunities have already been exhausted, and establishing their activities is impossible. The positive consequences of the introduction of the Code should be a reduction in the terms of application of property management procedures and sanitation measures while increasing the efficiency of these measures.

How Much Will Safe Sanitation for all Cost? Evidence from Five Cities.

Global sustainable development goals call for universal access to safely managed sanitation by 2030. Here, we demonstrate methods to estimate the financial requirements for meeting this commitment in urban settings of low-income countries. Our methods considered two financial requirements: (i) the subsidies needed to bridge the gap between the willingness-to-pay of low-income households and actual market prices of toilets and emptying services and (ii) the amounts needed to expand the municipal waste management infrastructure for unserved populations. We applied our methods in five cities- Kisumu, Malindi, Nakuru in Kenya; Kumasi in Ghana; and Rangpur in Bangladesh and compared three to five sanitation approaches in each city. We collected detailed cost data on the sanitation infrastructure, products, and services from 76 key informants across the five cities, and we surveyed a total of 2381 low-income households to estimate willingness-to-pay. We found that the total financial requirements for achieving universal sanitation in the next 10 years and their breakdown between household subsidies and municipal infrastructure varied greatly between sanitation approaches. Across our study cities, sewerage was the costliest approach (total financial requirements of 16-24 USD/person/year), followed by container-based sanitation (10-17 USD/person/year), onsite sanitation (2-14 USD/person/year), and mini-sewers connecting several toilets to communal septic tanks (3-5 USD/person/year). Further applications of our methods can guide sanitation planning in other cities.

Ex-ante quantification of nutrient, total solids, and water flows in sanitation systems

To prioritise sustainable sanitation systems in strategic sanitation planning, indicators such as local appropriateness or resource recovery have to be known at the pre-planning phase. The quantification of resource recovery remains a challenge because existing substance flow models require large amounts of input data and can therefore only be applied for a few options at a time for which implementation examples exist. This paper aims to answer two questions: How can we predict resource recovery and losses of sanitation systems ex-ante at the pre-planning phase? And how can we do this efficiently to consider the entire sanitation system option space? The approach builds on an existing model to create all valid sanitation systems from a set of conventional and emerging technologies and to evaluate their appropriateness for a given application case. It complements the previous model with a Substance Flow Model (SFM) and with transfer coefficients from a technology library to quantify nutrients (phosphorus and nitrogen), total solids (as an indicator for energy and organics), and water flows in sanitation systems ex ante. The transfer coefficients are based on literature data and expert judgement. Uncertainties resulting from the variability of literature data or ignorance of experts are explicitly considered, allowing to assess the robustness of the model output. Any (future) technologies or additional products can easily be added to the library. The model is illustrated with a small didactic example showing how 12 valid system configurations are generated from a few technologies, and how substance flows, recovery ratios, and losses to soil, air, and water are quantified considering uncertainties. The recovery ratios vary between 0 and 28% for phosphorus, 0–10% for nitrogen, 0–26% for total solids, and 0–12% for water. The uncertainties reflect the high variability of the literature data but are comparable to those obtained in studies using a conventional post-ante material flow analysis (generally about 30% variability at the scale of a an urban area). Because the model is fully automated and based on literature data, it can be applied ex-ante to a large and diverse set of possible sanitation systems as shown with a real application case. From the 41 technologies available in the library, 101,548 systems are generated and substance flows are modelled. The resulting recovery ratios range from nothing to almost 100%. The two examples also show that recovery depend on technology interactions and has therefore to be assessed for all possible system configurations and not at the single technology level only. The examples also show that there exist trade-offs among different types of reuse (e.g. energy versus nutrients) or different sustainability indicators (e.g. local appropriateness versus resource recovery). These results show that there is a need for such an automated and generic approach that provides recovery data for all system configurations already at the pre-planning phase. The approach presented enables to integrate transparently the best available knowledge for a growing number of sanitation technologies into a planning process. The resulting resource recovery and loss ratios can be used to prioritise resource efficient systems in sanitation planning, either for the pre-selection or the detailed evaluation of options using e.g. MCDA. The results can also be used to guide future development of technology and system innovations. As resource recovery becomes more relevant and novel sanitation technologies and system options emerge, the approach presents itself as a useful tool for strategic sanitation planning in line with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Chemical and biological monitoring of water quality on a hydrographic basin in the State of Santa Catarina

The inappropriate destination of urban effluents, deforestation along the banks of watercourses, expanding agricultural activities, as well as the lack of public management plans for the prevention and adequacy of the use of urban rivers, compromise the efficiency of basic sanitation services and consequently the health of the population. The objective of this research is to monitor the water quality of the Itajaí-Açu river, the largest watercourse in the Itajaí hydrographic basin, located in the State of Santa Catarina, based on the seasonal chemical and biological indicators, in addition to verifying the statistically significant difference between the sample points. For this purpose, five collection points were allocated along the river, for the aforementioned indicators, in the seasons, spring and summer (2019); autumn and winter (2020), totaling 80 samples. To verify the statistically significant difference between the sample points, the Statistical Software R, version 3.6.3 was used. The results pointed to the chemical and biological contamination along the entire length of the Itajaí-Açu river, regardless of the seasonal aspect. There is an urgent need to implement Municipal Basic Sanitation Plans in all the municipalities that are part of the Itajaí watershed. The absence or precariousness of a planning instrument for the provision of public sanitation services in the municipalities, in addition to violating the legal principle of human dignity of access to clean water and adequate sanitation, contributes to the increase of the environmental degradation of the territory as well as the health of its population.

How can Urban Planners Address Emerging Zoonoses? A Scoping Review of Recommended Interventions

Emerging zoonotic diseases (EZD) like Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), COVID-19, and Ebola have highlighted the need for incorporating emerging zoonoses considerations in urban planning practice. To mainstream EZD in urban planning, this scoping review collates recommendations from across disciplines to provide directions to city planners and policymakers. A search of published literature examining the relationship between EZD and urban planning or policymaking was conducted in February 2020 using PubMed, Web of Science, and Scopus. Thirty-six articles were identified by the review process and the research examining the relationship between urban planning and EZD was found to be limited but expanding. In identified articles, recommendations for planners were found to address various areas and aspects of planning like inter-disciplinary collaboration, social justice, built environment, climate change adaptation, urbanization, sanitation, green space and economic planning. The applicability of these recommendations to global north and south cities is also discussed.

Lessons from co-designing a resource-recovery game for collaborative urban sanitation planning

The aim of this study is to describe the development of an innovative planning tool to promote the knowledge and collaboration needed to overcome challenges in the sanitation sector. A serious game was designed to share knowledge about resource recovery and support attitude-change and collaboration between stakeholders. This study documents the co-design process of game development from conception based on a set of specifications the game should achieve, through iterative testing with relevant stakeholders as players. The resulting prototype of the game showed that it was not possible to include all the original desired specifications in the final game. Stakeholders found that the game was engaging, stimulated creativity and achieved its goal.

Practical experience testing aspects of market development for city-wide inclusive sanitation

Achieving effective, city-wide inclusive sanitation service delivery requires coordination of diverse actors in the sanitation value chain as many factors constrain the efficiency and quality of faecal sludge management (FSM). In partnership with government, consumer, and private sector stakeholders in Bihar’s capital city, Patna, PSI India facilitated extensive market analysis, identified the market challenges, and co-developed a market-based urban FSM services ‘ecosystem’ which resulted in the safe collection, treatment, and disposal of over 7 million litres of faecal sludge from more than an estimated 1,500 households over two years, as part of bundled portable toilet cabins and FSM services. The FSM programme Praashadan, funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, built trust, improved coordination, and brokered official agreements between tanker operators and government, tested a portable toilet cabin business model to subsidize operation of a faecal sludge treatment plant, and established a call centre and promotional activities to drive customers to the services of a newly formed tanker operators association. Moving forward there is a need to place the work with these market actors into a wider context of a financed, coordinated, city-wide sanitation planning to address technology, R&D, and other constraints that support better business models and allow regular quality FSM services.

'Pollute the bay and poison the people': A short history of the Green Point marine sewage outfall, 1882–1992

The City of Cape Town in South Africa pumps 40 million litres of untreated sewage into the Atlantic Ocean from the Green Point outfall pipeline every day. This results in microbial and chemical pollution of the sea (including persistent organic pollutants), marine organisms and recreational beaches, breaching the City’s constitutional commitment to ‘prevent pollution and ecological degradation’ and, in doing so, it fails to uphold the constitutional right to an environment for citizens that is not harmful to ‘health or well-being’. This article explores how the decision to build this marine outfall was reached in 1895. It illustrates how narrow economic interests from the 1880s until today have driven the City’s commitment to the Green Point outfall despite a long history of opposition from citizens and scientists and repeated instances of pollution and ill-health. The findings reveal how, rather than being the cost-saving option that the City has always claimed it to be, its maintenance has cost enormous sums of money. The story of the Green Point outfall is one in which unimaginative, short-term monetary thinking has thwarted the search for an ecologically and hydrologically sustainable alternative means of sewage disposal – a legacy the City’s residents and the oceans that surround it live with today.
 Significance:
 
 The findings show that the disposal of untreated sewage into the sea at Green Point has always been controversial (scientifically, politically and socially), and has resulted in episodes of illness among Cape Town citizens. It has never been the most economic option as repeatedly asserted by the City Council. The findings also illustrate that the City Council has consistently rejected ecologically and hydrologically sustainable alternative disposal options, and has denied problems associated with the outfall, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, a pattern which persists. These findings are important for civic governance, desalination, water quality, environmental humanities, health (human and marine), sanitation and urban planning.

Review of frameworks and tools for urban strategic sanitation planning: considering technology innovations and sustainability

Abstract To achieve citywide inclusive sanitation in developing countries, a strategic sanitation planning approach (SSA) needs to provide a variety of technical solutions that respond to different urban realities. Despite the development of various SSA frameworks, sanitation planning still often follows a ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach. Structured decision making (SDM) can help by balancing trade-offs among different solutions. But SDM requires a set of appropriate sanitation options to choose from. Because conventional sewer-based sanitation is often inappropriate, many novel technologies and systems have been developed (e.g. container-based sanitation). While these innovations enhance sustainability, they also increase planning complexity. In this review, we look at available frameworks and tools for SSA and discover a lack of systematic tools for the identification of planning options that are able to consider the growing portfolio of available solutions and multiple sustainability criteria. Therefore, we critically compare 15 tools from which we compile eight qualities that could help any future tool address the current sanitation challenge: it should be comprehensive, automated to deal with a large number of options, systematic, flexible towards future innovation and should consider all sustainability dimensions, make a contextualized evaluation, allow for participation, and consider uncertainties to be applicable ex-ante also for novel technologies.

Costs, Climate and Contamination: Three Drivers for Citywide Sanitation Investment Decisions

Significant progress is needed, in both large cities and small towns, to meet the ambitious targets set at international and national levels relating to universal access to safely managed sanitation. There has been increased recognition in the urban sanitation sector that in rapidly growing cities, there is unlikely to be a single centralised sanitation solution which can effectively deliver services to all demographics, and that heterogeneous approaches to urban sanitation are required. At the same time, due to competing investment priorities, there is a greater focus on the need for sanitation investments to address multiple objectives. However, calls for more informed sanitation planning and a more dynamic and disaggregated approach to the delivery and management of sanitation services have had limited impacts. This is in part due to the complexity of the drivers for sanitation investment, and the difficulties involved in identifying and addressing these multiple, often conflicting, goals. This paper examines three potential drivers of citywide sanitation decision-making – public health, sustainability and economic performance – via the three proxies of contamination, climate change and costs. It examines the importance of each driver and proxies, how they are considered in investment decisions, the current state of knowledge about them, and priority aspects to be included in decisions. At present, while public health is a common driver for improving sanitation, there are significant gaps in our understanding of faecal contamination spread and exposure, and how to select sanitation solutions which can best address them. Climate change is sometimes seen as a low priority for the sanitation sector given the immediacy and scale of existing challenges and the uncertainty of future climate predictions. However, potential risks are significant, and uninformed decisions may result in greater costs and increased inequalities. Cost data are sparse and unreliable, and it is challenging to build robust cost-effectiveness analyses. Yet these are needed to compare citywide options based on least-cost over their full life cycle. This paper provides insights into how existing evidence on contamination, climate change and costs can inform decisions on sanitation investments and help chart a sustainable way forward for achieving citywide services.

Comparative analysis of sanitation systems for resource recovery: Influence of configurations and single technology components

Resource recovery and emissions from sanitation systems are critical sustainability indicators for strategic urban sanitation planning. In this context, sanitation systems are the most often structured using technology-driven templates rather than performance-based sustainability indicators. In this work, we answer two questions: Firstly, can we estimate generic resource recovery and loss potentials and their uncertainties for a diverse and large set of sanitation systems? And secondly, can we identify technological aspects of sanitation systems that indicate a better overall resource recovery performance? The aim is to obtain information that can be used as an input into any strategic planning process and to help shape technology development and system design for resource recovery in the future. Starting from 41 technologies, which include novel and conventional options, we build 101,548 valid sanitation system configurations. For each system configuration we quantify phosphorus, nitrogen, total solids, and water flows and use that to calculate recovery potentials and losses to the environment, i.e. the soil, air, or surface water. The four substances cover different properties and serve as a proxy for nutrient, organics, energy, and water resources. For modelling the flows ex-ante, we use a novel approach to consider a large range of international literature and expert data considering uncertainties. Thus all results are generic and can therefore be used as input into any strategic planning process or to help guide future technology development. A detailed analysis of the results allows us to identify factors that influence recovery and losses. These factors include the type of source, the length of systems, and the level of containment in storage and treatment. The factors influencing recovery are related to interactions of different technologies in a system which shows the relevance of a modelling approach that allows to look at all possible system configurations systematically. Based on our analysis, we developed five recommendations for the optimization of resource recovery: (i) prioritize short systems that close the loop at the lowest possible level; (ii) separate waste streams as much as possible, because this allows for higher recovery potentials; (iii) use storage and treatment technologies that contain the products as much as possible, avoid leaching technologies (e.g. single pits) and technologies with high risk of volatilization (e.g. drying beds); (iv) design sinks to optimise recovery and avoid disposal sinks; and (v) combine various reuse options for different side streams (e.g. urine diversion systems that combine reuse of urine and production of biofuel from faeces).

Transparência e universalização dos Índices de Água e Esgoto no Estado do Pará, Brasil

O presente estudo teve o objetivo de investigar como os princípios da transparência e universalização do acesso ao saneamento básico previstos na Lei Federal nº 11.445 de 2007, que dispõe o Plano Nacional de Saneamento Básico, veem sido cumpridos e alcançados nos municípios do estado do Pará para os serviços de abastecimento de água e coleta de esgoto sanitário. Para isto, foram obtidos e analisados os dados disponibilizados pelos municípios paraenses no banco de dados do Sistema Nacional de Informações Sobre Saneamento. Os resultados demonstram que o princípio da transparência não vem sendo cumprido por boa parte desses municípios por conta ou da falta de submissão de dados ou da continuidade destes. Quanto à universalização ao acesso, foi percebido que os municípios paraenses analisados estão indo por um caminho contrário a este princípio em relação ao serviço de abastecimento de água potável, enquanto que para a coleta de esgoto sanitário, os municípios cuja análise foi possível realizar, apresentaram pequenos avanços.

Improving inpatient provider-initiated HIV testing and counseling in Sierra Leone.

Only 47% of HIV-positive Sierra Leoneans knew their status in 2017, making expanded HIV testing a priority. National guidelines endorse provider-initiated HIV testing and counselling (PITC) to increase testing coverage, but PITC is rarely provided in Sierra Leone. In response, a Quality Improvement Collaborative (QIC) was implemented to improve PITC coverage amongst adult inpatients. Ten hospitals received the intervention between October 2017 and August 2018; there were no control facilites. Each hospital aimed to improve PITC coverage to ≥ 95% of eligible patients. Staff received training on PITC and QIC methods and a package of PITC best practices and tools. They then worked to identify additional contextually-appropriate interventions, conducted rapid tests of change, and tracked performance using shared indicators and time-series data. Supportive supervision bolstered QI skills, and quarterly meetings enabled diffusion of innovations while spurring friendly competition. Baseline PITC coverage was 4%. The hospital teams tested diverse interventions using QI methods, including staff training; data review meetings; enhanced workflow processes and supervision; and patient education and sensitization activities Nine hospitals reached and sustained the 95% target, and all saw rapid and durable improvement, which was sustained for a median of six months. Of the 5,238 patients tested for HIV, 311 (6%) were found to be HIV-positive and were referred for treatment. HIV rapid test kit stockouts occurred during the project period, limiting PITC services in some cases. The intervention led to swift and sustained improvement in inpatient PITC coverage and to the diagnosis of hundreds of people living with HIV. Sierra Leone's Ministry of Health and Sanitation plans to take the initiative to national scale, with close attention to the issue of test kit stockouts.

Developing sanitation planning options: A tool for systematic consideration of novel technologies and systems

To provide access to sustainable sanitation for the entire world population, novel technologies and systems have been developed. These options are often independent of sewers, water, and energy and therefore promise to be more appropriate for fast-growing urban areas. They also allow for resource recovery and and are adaptable to changing environmental and demographic conditions what makes them more sustainable. More options, however, also enhance planning complexity. Structured decision making (SDM) can help balance opposing interests. Yet, most of the current research focuses on the selection of a preferred option, assuming that a set of appropriate options is available. There is a lack of reproducible methods for the identification of sanitation system planning options that can consider the growing number of available technology and the many possible system configurations. Additionally, there is a lack of data, particularly for novel options, to evaluate the various sustainability criteria for sanitation.To overcome this limitation, we present a novel software supported approach: the SANitation sysTem Alternative GeneratOr (Santiago). To be optimally effective, Santiago is required to be integrated into an SDM approach. In this paper, we present all the elements that such an integration requires and illustrate these methods at the case of Arba Minch, a fast growing town in Ethiopia. Based on this example and experiences from other cases, we discuss the lessons learnt and present the advantages potentially brought by Santiago for sanitation planning The integration requires four elements: a set of technologies to be looked at, decision objectives for sustainable sanitation, screening criteria to evalute technology appropriateness, and about the technologies and the casea. The main output is a set of sanitation system options that is locally appropriate, diverse in order to reveal trade-offs, and of a manageable size. To support the definition of decision objectives, we developed a generic objective hierarchy for sustainable sanitation. Because one of the main challenges lies in the quantification of screening criteria, we established the data for 27 criteria and 41 technologies in a library.The case studies showed, that if the integration is successful, then Santiago can provide substantial benefits: (i) it is systematic and reproducible; (ii) it opens up the decision space with novel and potentially more appropriate solutions; (iii) it makes international data accessible for more empirical decision making; (iv) it enables decisions based on strategic objectives in line with the sustainable development goals; (v) it allows to prioritise appropriate and resource efficient systems right from the beginning (vi) and it contributes to a more citywide inclusive approach by bridging strategic objectives with an area-based appropriateness assessment. The here presented approach enables the prioritisation of appropriate and resource efficient sanitation technologies and systems in strategic planning. Thereby this approach contributes to SDG 6.2, 6.3, and 11, sustainable sanitation for all.

Integrated Methodology for Co-designing and Co-creating for Sustainable Sanitation Project

The study explored the framework for an integrated methodology for co-designing and co-creation (collaboratively), in prototyping a design system for tackling sanitation issues within a section of a community in Ghana. The aim was to test an integrated approach in exploring design-thinking approaches that stimulate, and support sustainable environmental sanitation, through behaviour changes. With the framework as our methodological approach to generate a sustainably clean environment with end users, we sought to explore the benefits of stakeholders’ voices in decision-making in sanitation planning; and ascertain their contributions to improving their environment as a result of behaviour change. The results indicate that integrated methodologies are flexible and useful when prototyping with design systems especially with the stakeholders (co-designers) in collaborative (design intervention) approach. Stakeholders’ voices when heard, in decision-making, do not just encourage sanitation planning on their streets and environment, but also helped boost the self-efficacy of managing their sanitation challenges. Keywords: Integrated Methodologies, FraIM, Sustainable Sanitation, Environmental Sanitation, Design thinking DOI: 10.7176/ADS/83-11 Publication date: July 31 st 2020