Return to nature
VIETNAM: The Vietnamese toilet system comprises two chambers - each with a faeces-holding capacity of 0.3 cubic metres. The chambers are built on a 10-cm thick floor to prevent flooding during torrential rainfall. They are covered with a slab that has two holes, foot rests and a groove to drain urine.
The chambers are used on a rotational basis. Five to ten persons can use each chamber for about two months. Before use, the chamber floors are covered with soil to prevent faeces from sticking to the floor. Ash is sprinkled over the faeces after every use. This absorbs moisture, neutralises bad odour and keeps the flies away. When the chamber is two-thirds full, earth is added and then it is sealed. The second chamber is then put to use. After two months, the first chamber is unsealed and the decomposed faeces are used as fertilisers. Even urine that gets drained through the groove and collected in a jar is used as fertiliser. The system, to a great extent, prevents spraying of fresh excreta in the rice fields. It also prevents contamination of soil and water resources. However, the two months retention period is too short for total pathogen destruction.
LADAKH: In most houses of Ladakh, the toilet is housed on the upper floors. It is a small room whose floor is covered with a thick layer of soil from the garden. There is a hole in the floor that allows excreta to fall into a compartment built for that purpose.
People excrete on the soil. They then shove the faeces and some of the soil into the ground floor compartment through the hole with the help of a shovel or a spade. Even the urine is drained into the ground floor room. The region's dry climate helps in the decomposition of the faeces without separating it from the urine. For better decomposition, ash together with heaps of soil is added to the pile of the ground floor room. The decomposed excreta is removed during spring and at the end of summer season and then used as a soil conditioner. The advantages of this system are: no odour if the toilet is maintained well, does not lead to breeding of flies and proves to be very useful in case of short water supply. The system is working well in most rural areas of Ladakh, with the exception of Leh's central part where soil is not available in abundance.
YEMEN: In Yemen, most of the houses are multi-storied and each floor has a toilet situated next to a shaft. The shaft runs from the housetop to a receptacle located at ground level. The urine is drained from the toilet's squatting slab to a groove. From there it goes through an opening in the wall of the house, down a vertical drainage surface built on the outer surface of the building. Most of urine gets evaporated on its way down the drainage surface. The rest, if any, is drained into a soakpit.
The faeces get dropped through the squatting hole of the toilet, down the shaft, to the receptacle. Dried faeces are periodically collected, further dried on the roof of a neighbourhood public bath and then used as fuel for heating water. Even in this system, there is no problem of foul smell and breeding of flies. The final disposal of the excreta is also safe as burning efficiently destroys all pathogenic organisms.
However, those who empty the receptacles may at times come into contact with fresh excreta and flies may contaminate the faeces when they are being dried on the bath roof.
Related Content
- Fuelling change: how oil and mining companies can finance the energy transition
- Adapting to natural disasters in Africa: what’s in it for the private sector?
- Indian Petroleum & Natural Gas Statistics 2021-22
- Agricultural technologies in India: a review
- Global land outlook 2022
- Gas market report 2022 including gas market highlights 2021