Costs and prices of technologies
Matthias Saladin - Sunday 14 May 2006
Hello everyone,
My name is Matthias Saladin, I am working for the SODIS Foundation. In spite of our name, we have not been promoting only SODIS but a series of low-cost HWTS in Latin America over the past 5 years.
In our experience, cost is only a small part of the picture. For example, with chlorine products costing as little as 5-10 cents for treating 10-20 liters of water, it's difficult to argue that costs are the limiting factor why HWTS is not practised more commonly. In our experience, other factors play an important role as well - in the case of chlorine products for example, it's also a matter of product availability. In many countries of Latin America, the Ministries of Health give chlorine products for free to the families. While this may sound like a good idea - and one which probably was appropriate during cholera outbreaks and in post-emergency situations - it also creates two problems:
- people depend on the distribution (many families report drinking raw water "because the health post didn't give me the chlorine")
- people are not willing to pay for such products because they can get them for free at the health post.
With the method of water boiling, costs seem to be low at first sight, especially if the water is boiled with fire wood. But collecting the wood actually is very expensive in terms of productive time lost... and wood as well as other fuels imply high environmental costs.
We have found that SODIS is a widely accepted method, but not only because of its low cost - many other factors such as taste and attractiveness of a method play an important role.
But generally, introducing a new method for water treatment is not easily done. Negotiating techniques during household visits can help a lot (see other contribution), but also other social marketing approaches and motivational techniques can improve a specific method - or a mix of several methods - being practices by the families who have been consuming raw water up to now.
Looking forward to hear from other institutions who have promoted several technologies under "real-life"-conditions.
Best regards,
Matthias
www.fundacionsodis.org (so far, only available in Spanish)
Acceptability of methods
Renuka Bery - Sunday 14 May 2006
Matthais and Larry...and others
The Hygiene Improvement Project and Solutions Inc, (Nepal) recently conducted a product trial in Nepal of water treatment methods available or soon to be available in four districts. Mothers with small children participated in the study and evaluated one of four water treatment methods (CS filter, chlorination, SODIS, boiling) according to particular characteristics: taste, smell, appearance, temperature, acceptability to family methods, ease of use, perceived effectiveness and perceived value. Respondents perceived SODIS as a relatively easy method of water disinfection, but did not particularly like it as it was dependent on the sun and couldn’t be used in all weather conditions. Most common dislikes of the methods included the warm temperature rendered by boiling, SODIS, and to a lesser degree, perceived from chlorination. Many reported general lack of availability of bottles that could present a barrier to SODIS use. The research team also reported unavailability of bottles at study locations….Many respondents using SODIS were eager to try a different water treatment method, preferably a method that could be used throughout the year and not be dependent on sunshine.
In this product trial, the CS filter was the most popular method across all districts for its ease of use, but questions remained about the efficacy of the CS filter based on the level of contaminated water after treatment. It was unclear from this trial whether the problems are with the filter systems themselves or with secondary contamination associated with improper filter maintenance.
Are these findings in Nepal similar to those you have found in Latin America?
For more information, the executive summary of this product trial is available in the background materials section of this e-conference (www.hip.watsan.net.)
Renuka Bery
comparisions
Matthias Saladin - Monday 15 May 2006
Dear Renuka,
I find the Nepal study quite interesting. However, if I understand the design correctly, the different technologies were given to the families for free - so it's hardly surprising filters are very popular, while other technologies seem to be less attractive.
As far as our experience with SODIS is concerned:
- weather is limiting in only very few places we have been working so far - even in regions with rainy seasons, you often have 6 hours of sunshine every day. Or you leave the bottles out for 2 days, which means you need more bottles and more planning, but this can be achieved by working with a behavior-change-methodology.
- bottle availability may be an issue in some regions - that's why you have to come up with local supply schemes or other ideas when promoting the SODIS method. In Latin America, bottles are available even in very remote settlings, but poor families may not buy bottled drinks, so the promoting entity has to develop a strategy on how to overcome that. In our experience, collecting the bottles at the selling point (small shops) and then distrituting them through the local health promoters has worked well.
New topic
Arinita - Tuesday 16 May 2006
Dear all,
It is great to see many of my collegues from around the world are giving valuable inputs on HWTS and I feel that I should share some of our experience in Nepal, as Nepal is already part of the conversation. I am Arinita M Shrestha and I work for Environment and Public Health Organization (ENPHO) as Program Manager for HWTS unit.
ENPHO has had significant experience in promoting HWTS in Nepal including SODIS, Chlorine solution, Kanchan arsenic removal filters and many others. In all cases, we have felt that following things should be taken care of when we talk about promoting HWTS:
1) if people really know what we mean safe water and if they are aware that their water is safe or not. Do they have access to testing their water and is it affordable?
2) If people have adequate knowledge on the kinds of HWTS that we are promoting. This makes a lot of difference on the acceptance of any HWTS. If they do not know how it is used and what are the advantages and contraints they will either neglect HWTS and safe water and on the other hand may not be conscious on getting safe water at all.
3) Community setting is very important, this includes physical and socio-economic aspects. If we try to promote a technology where people have hard time accepting it then we should not try to force them to use it.This is where we go wrong, as we may have selfish interest to achieve our project goals at times . Rather we should be ready to give them alternatives.I would like to share few examples of HWTS in Nepal and our lessons. For SODIS we have tried our best to promote in both urban and rural settings with many promotional and advocacy activities. And we had tried to focus on poors. What we have learned is that if we only go for poor, the poor gets the idea that this technolgy is only for poor not for others. This makes them feel excluded from the society's routines and do not want to continue it because they will be titled as poor. This is not what we want. On the other hand we have also realised that farmers who needs to work from early morning are irregular users of HWTS and in our case SODIS as they hardly have time to fill the bottles for the day or two. We have felt that in rural areas due to bottlw problem it is not feasible so far. However, we are looking for other options such as scrap collectors who may help in bringing bottles in the communties. This will also take some time.
Similarly, for chlorination, their are certain group of population who do not like the taste/ smell. There are group of people who are insecure about just using filter, so they again boil or chlorinate it. What we have learnt from all of this is we cannot go with one option at all. There should at least be 2-3 options in hands to give alternatives. When we go to promote a technology then we usually say something not good about the technology they are using it. This may give an idea that we are markeitng the new HWTS. This should not be done. If for example a household is using a filter then when we go to promote chlorination or sodis, we should be able show advantages and disadvantages of all 3 options including filter and at times we may also end up guiding on using filter itself. The goal is to get safe water, not changing products
And the most important part is to add water quality, sanitation , hygiene practice and, economic and health benefits when promoting HWTS. Access to information on availability,technical support and if possible local resource center for HWTS is also needed.
Arinita
