Rural Sanitation Marketing:

Rural Sanitation Marketing:
Period of
Adjustment
everyone | foreve r
Background
13%
There was a signiﬁcant uptake of concrete
dome slabs by rural households where, as
mentioned, the harvested humanure would
act as payment. However, the business side of
things was not as positive.
The business model failed!
Instead of a vibrant sanitation market
underpinned by a viable supply chain and
sustainable demand, the humanure, which
was hoped to be a sellable product, could not
ﬁnd a ready market and was thus unable to
function as an alternative payback mechanism
for households; this negatively affected the
expected returns for the masons businesses.
This further resulted in masons being unable
to re-invest and expand their services.
Additionally, the hardware subsidy distorted
market expectations causing households
not to invest their hard-earned money in
purchasing a product whose production
was heavily subsidized. What followed were
demotivated masons resulting in failed
businesses, lost revenues and, in many cases,
concrete dome slabs that were taken up by
several households – but not paid for
30%
With per capita income at around USD23.00
, Chikhwawa is one of the poorest districts in
Malawi with improved sanitation coverage
at 13% and with 31% of the population
practicing open defecation. The Majority of
residents of Chikhwawa use basic sanitation
facilities that offer very little privacy and
are often structurally unsafe. 4 years ago,
Water For People Malawi pioneered
what many considered to be undoable ~
establishing a sanitation market in the rural
area of Chikhwawa as one way of providing
sustainable sanitation service delivery for the
rural poor so as to improve health outcomes.
This endeavor was known as Sanitation as a
Business or Sanitation Marketing. Through a
mason training programme, revolving input
subsidy fund and a simple payback scheme
that involved humanure , the program hoped
to stimulate demand for sanitation by focusing
on strengthening the supply side of the market
system. Often referred to as the “Mason
Model”, the model trained close to 70 masons
who received cement and reinforcement as
hardware subsidy to kickstart their businesses
and provide improved sanitation products and
services to households.
What Has Changed?
Some key lessons were learnt from the Mason
Model which have completely reshaped and
re-organized the way Water For People views
rural sanitation markets and how to create
them. Some of these crucial lessons included:
• Masons are not Entrepreneurs
• Previous subsidies, provided by other
NGOs, distorted the market
• Humanure was not a viable payment option
Based on 2012 Chikhwawa District Council Socio-Economic Proﬁle and exchange rates at that time.
This is composted human fecal material and urine
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Rural Sanitation Marketing In Chikhwawa:
Before and After
These lessons provided some ideas for re-adjusting the Sanitation Marketing approach for rural
Chikhwawa. The obvious question is: What has been the change?
Short for Tools for Enterprise and Education Consultants URL: www.teecs.net
Percentage of trained entrepreneurs still providing sanitation services
Based on Random Market Assessment of 7 entrepreneurs in 2011
Based on exchange rate in 2011 and entrepreneur record of sales
Based on support visit data from between July to September 2013
Calculated by dividing A by B i.e. A/B
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However, the improvements have yielded
noticeable results which could be accredited
to the following attributes of this new model:
Conclusion
•
Leveraging the expertise of the business
consultancy ﬁrm, TEECs, helped enhance
the business development ﬁeld work with
sound market-based theory and practical
commercial savvy. TEECs supported the
development of deliberate selection
criteria, and further designed and
delivered the modular training sessions
with entrepreneurs.
• Emphasis, time and investment were put
into recruiting, training and following up
the right entrepreneurs. Finding the right
people proved crucial as the selected
entrepreneurs, by virtue of them being
entrepreneurial, found opportunities
for products and services that Water For
People had initially not considered e.g.
drop hole covers. Furthermore, some
entrepreneurs have registered some
success linking humanure and agriculture
e.g. cotton production; which was a failure
initially with the Mason Model.
• Performance-based approach to the modular training not only helps identify (and
eliminate) those entrepreneurs who are not
“serious about business”, but it is also helps
create a conducive atmosphere for critical
feedback and thinking around various business ideas that entrepreneurs would prefer
to explore.
• Incorporation of CLTS as a promotional tool
for creating demand for sanitation services
helped boost sales as evidenced by higher demand from triggered villages than
non-triggered villages.
Though it is still too early to declare success,
based on the relatively improved ﬁnancial
data, and isolate key enablers and lessons
from this experience, the results indicate that
the paradigm shift in approach has yielded
signiﬁcant incremental impacts which further
reinforces the lesson gained from the original
‘Mason Model’ that “Masons are not Entrepreneurs”. Changing the selection process and
ﬁnding the right entrepreneurs has improved
other aspects of this rural sanitation marketing
model that proved unsuccessful before 2011
e.g. humanure is slowly becoming a viable
product (see case study below).
However, the table above also shows a glaring
trade-off i.e. the “Mason Model” had a higher
expected revenue (based on slabs that were
sold on credit) , but lower payback rate (i.e.
4%), while the revised model has a perfect
payback rate (100%), but lower sales which,
in NGO terms, means lower latrine coverage
despite better business practice. This tradeoff clearly highlights the impact of external
investment ﬁnancing in the rural sanitation
market both household and business
investment ﬁnancing ~ moving forward this
aspect has to be considered as in how best to
increase all round ﬁnancing without causing
market distortions.
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•
•
•
•
•
Do we rule out capital investment completely even
for exceptional entrepreneurs?
Should entrepreneurs also participate in CLTS
triggering of villages they intend to reach with
services?
What happens after GSF funding runs out if CLTS
triggering remains within the local government
domain? Will Local government continue to pay for
demand creation going forward?
How do we ensure that local government monitors
and coordinates NGO activity to ensure adherence
to the national sanitation marketing strategy which,
among other things, prohibits sanitation hardware
subsidies for households?
How do we reach those who are unable to pay for
services but desire better sanitation options?
Food For Thought
However, despite some positive movement, there
remain grey areas that require reﬂection and
experimentation. For example:
Nonetheless, this new approach is providing meaningful
lessons and challenging accepted sector practice which,
collectively, is pushing us closer to answering that ever
elusive question: can sanitation marketing work in the
rural areas?
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Case Study:
Winston is a quintessential resident of Timbenawo village in Traditional Authority of
Chapananga in Chikhwawa. There is nothing
particularly extraordinary about him. He is
married with a small family like most men in his
village. And like most people in the village, he
leads a simple farmer’s life: cultivating maize
for consumption and cotton for selling to the
many multinationals that purchase cotton on
the open market. Winston’s livelihood is dependent on having a good cotton harvest as it
is the difference between living and starving to
death.
However, the recent economic downturn,
which led to a drastic increase in cost of living,
also impacted the price of the most important
input of his cotton farming business ~ artiﬁcial
fertilizer ~ making it expensive and reducing
the buying power of his already small household budget. No matter how hard Winston
works in the ﬁeld, he knows deep inside
himself that, without adequate fertilizer, no
amount of hard work will make a difference.
He needs an alternative.
“I heard that Water For People was calling
for business people who were interested in
branching into sanitation business” he recalls.
“I decided I should try it out.”
Winston attended the interviews ~ he was
selected.
After the ﬁrst two modules of a rigorous
three module training programme, Winston
was drawn to one business in particular –
humanure.
“Initially I was skeptical.” Winston recalls. “Are
these trainers serious that we should use
human waste as fertilizer? But after visiting one
of the older entrepreneurs who was using it, I
decided to try it.”
Winston started selling sanitation products
to households, e.g. slabs, drop-hole covers,
and used the revenue to invest in purchasing
humanure from some households with
composting latrines and entrepreneurs. Of
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course it wasn’t easy in the beginning
though.
“People thought I was crazy using human
waste. People would say you are using
someone’s shit! But now I am the envy
of many farmers!” Winston says with a
glimmer of cheekiness in his eye.
What had changed was that Winston
discovered that humanure was ﬁve times
cheaper than artiﬁcial fertilizer and he
got far larger volumes than with artiﬁcial
fertilizer.
“With just MWK 300.00 I was able to buy
one 50 KG bag while with MWK 1,500.00
I was only able to purchase 200g of
artiﬁcial fertilizer. “ Winston explains. “Also
I only needed to apply humanure once in
the ﬁeld while with artiﬁcial fertilizer I had
to apply several times at different stages
of cotton germination. And as compared
with artiﬁcial fertilizer, the cotton looks
happier and bigger.” Winston adds whilst
holding a ball of cotton as he proudly
inspects his ﬁeld.
With reduced spending on fertilizer and
better yield, it means Winston saves more
and makes more money for himself and
his family. And it seems, despite being
ridiculed by some fellow farmers, he
doesn’t seem to be giving up anytime
soon.
“This isn’t just shit to me and my family
anymore. This is our livelihood! My family
and I have decided that we will not use
artiﬁcial fertilizer anymore ~ we are
behind humanure for life!” Winston says
with a determined look in his eye.
Winston used to be a quintessential rural
farmer in Chikhwawa like many others.
But now he has discovered that shit has
value and it has made all the difference in
the world to him and his family.
See Winston online in Water For People’s
“Where Do you Shit?” video:
http://goo.gl/yndgj9
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