Innovative approach to sanitation in
developing countries
One of the Millennium Development Goals the UN wants to achieve is safe drinking water and good sanitation for everyone. The target is to halve the number of people who do not have these universal human rights (and currently the number stands at about 2.5 billion!) by 2015. This year is also International Sanitation Year so there are good reasons for water specialist Roy Timmer to talk about the concept he recently developed for the Nigerian national drinking and waste water policy.
“Sanitation problems in developing countries have to be tackled differently,” says Roy Timmer. “Therefore we need new ways of thinking and working and also innovative financing mechanisms, such as credit and mesofinancing.”
The office in Hanoi was opened in 2007 as a representative office, but now it is a full Haskoning Vietnam branch office with its own design department in order to service clients from close by. Services such as project management, design and construction management are delivered from start to finish. There is now a staff 20 in Hanoi. Between them the two offices have 100 employees, of whom 90% are Vietnamese and only 10% come from other countries. New orders, construction management and now also design are coordinated from Hanoi for a growing number of projects in the north of Vietnam. Haskoning Hanoi Branch Manager Tjerk van der Meer explains. “Our two offices have the same approach and can jointly provide the complete package of services.
”In most developing countries, and particularly in Africa, governments are no longer able to improve their poor sanitation. The key to Roy Timmer’s new approach is that people pay for sanitary facilities themselves, primarily on the basis of more intensive cooperation with the small business sector. “However, they often do not have the money for this so we are introducing innovative financing mechanisms, such as rental/purchase agreements and credit facilities. It has turned out that people really use the facilities well and maintain them if they are the owners. For example the installation of a good on-site septic tank, built and maintained by a local contractor (where possible), is cheaper and more effective that an expensive (off-site) sewer system. The government can have a positive effect on this concept by providing individuals or groups with credit so they can build homes with a sufficiently good sanitation system,” explains Roy Timmer. “Governments can also assist by giving small and medium-sized businesses (which are usually not registered or incorporated) more help and thus bring the quality of their services up to an acceptable level. Governments can moreover implement and enforce regulations better by creating trade associations that represent businesses’ interests and grant quality marks to firms that are credit worthy. One thing is certain. First of all the population must be made aware of the importance of good sanitary facilities through national, regional and local campaigns. Immediately afterwards the facilities that have been promoted then actually have to be built using the local private sector.”
Royal Haskoning will be working together with Rabo India Finance, the (local) government and local businesses in a pilot project in India to investigate whether the concept of mesofinancing is also successful on a larger scale. Roy Timmer’s concept for the national drinking and waste water policy will also be presented during the Singapore Water Week at the end of June 2008.
Contact: Roy Timmer
+31 (0)24 3284 892
r.timmer@royalhaskoning.com
