Sludge Enterprise at WASH Futures Conference 2016

Published on: 12/01/2017

The Research into Sludge Enterprise (RISE) initiative: trialing, researching and demonstrating a viable model for mobile desludging in urban centres in Zimbabwe will enable the following:

• Local authorities will have a new tool to address sanitation challenges
• Private operators will have a viable business option that supports sanitation services
• Institutions will be able to reduce costs by desludging rather than building new toilet blocks
• Householders with latrines and septic tanks will have an affordable locally available emptying service
• Local Authorities and the EMA will be able to regulate the activities of licensed operators to ensure that faecal sludge is adequately collected, transported, treated and disposed.

About the WASH Futures Conference 2016

The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT), the Australian WASH Reference Group and the International Water Centre (IWC) partnered to deliver an international water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) conference in 2016. WASH Futures 2016 built on the successes of three earlier international WASH conferences in 2008, 2011 and 2014.

The conference comprised five days of activities with two days dedicated to conference-style sessions with parallel streams addressing specific themes, and three days of training workshops relating to the theme of the conference 'WASH Futures: Pathways to universal and sustained water, sanitation and hygiene'.

Some of the topics were:

• WASH management for sustainable service delivery
• WASH business, financing & private sectors
• Ensuring WASH reaches everyone
• Moving WASH beyond the household
• Integrating hygiene to ensure health outcomes
• WASH and water security
• WASH in the Pacific: situations and trends

The conference specifically drew out the issues of private sector participation in WASH, equity and WASH in the Pacific as cross-cutting themes.