An evaluation of the long-term functionality of Ecological Sanitation (EcoSan) projects in rural Burkina Faso : Reuse of sanitized human excreta as fertilizer in local agriculture

Abstract: 2.4 billion people worldwide lack access to basic sanitation solutions, with major health and environmental impact as a result. The recently adopted worldwide Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) aim to reduce this problem and extend the access to basic sanitation. The sanitation systems have to be safe to manage, and resources such as nutrients within the waste be recovered to a great extent, for the system to be worthwhile. For Burkina Faso, a low-income country in West Africa, achieving the SDGs will be a challenge, especially considering the almost 9 million people that lack access to basic sanitation. One way of achieving this is through Ecological Sanitation (EcoSan), an innovation with the goal of protecting human health and enabling reuse of sanitized human excreta as fertilizer. The overall purpose of this study is to provide sanitation practitioners in Burkina Faso with useful information on how to better carry out EcoSan interventions in the future, within the scope of achieving the SDGs.The study aim is to investigate why and to what extent earlier EcoSan latrines have not been used to their full capacity regarding nutrient recovery to local agriculture. The results are mainly based on a household survey conducted on rural Burkinabe households possessing an EcoSan latrine and supplemented with focus group discussions, key informant interviews and measurements on site. To fulfill the study objective, a material flow analysis was performed which showed that nutrient losses of nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium all were likely to exceed 80%, compared to the theoretically calculated values. Additionally, 14 barriers for recovery of nutrients were identified, where the most important ones concern urine collection and storage. Furthermore, results showed that use and reuse practices tended to be higher if initialtraining focused on agricultural aspects rather than hygiene aspects.