SANITATION
PIONEERING STANDARD TO END TOILET USE PARADIGM Around 25% the world’s population lacks access to basic sanitation. This is due to waterborne sanitation’s high costs, as well as growing water availability constraints. ISO 30500 (identically adopted by South Africa as SANS 30500) can assist in fasttracking the roll-out of off-grid or nonsewered sanitation. By Kirsten Kelly
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reviously, the public sector had been confronted with new sanitation technology but, because there was no national standard, the onus and responsibility were placed on public officials to provide the guidance and position in terms of validating these technologies. It also disadvantaged many good solutions providers from entering the market.
The Gates Foundation decided to initiate the development of the international standard, ISO 30500, because ISO is an inclusive platform that brings governments, business, civil society together to create innovative solutions
History
“The Water Research Commission (WRC) keeps being inundated with requests for the validation of new sanitation technology in the absence of any standards and testing platforms. This is a challenge, as without demonstration or testing, scale-up and application were at risk,” explains Jay Bhagwan, executive manager: Water Use and Waste Management, WRC.
Fortunately, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation decided to initiate the development of the ISO 30500 international standard. This was done with the intention of enhancing efforts to widely manufacture, market and deploy technologies (developed from their ‘Reinvent the Toilet’ challenge) – as well as several other
Jay Bhagwan, executive manager: Water Use and Waste Management, WRC
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