Financing sanitation for low-income urban communities: Lessons from CCODE and the Federation in Malawi

Like many other countries in the global South, Malawi has failed to meet Millennium Development Goal targets to improve access to sanitation. It has been estimated that only 25 per cent of the country’s population has gained access to improved sanitation since 1990, and access to it is a meagre 41 per cent, according to the latest Joint Monitoring Programme Report (2015).

By utilizing social capital and promoting ecological sanitation, CCODE (an affiliate of Slum/Shack Dwellers International) has enabled thousands of urban poor households, which could not afford better toilets, to live in dignity. This study shows that the CCODE model could do this for most of Malawi’s urban poor.

The offers several recommendations for achieving this:

1. Funding for sanitation needs to be increased, but financing should look at innovative ways of attaining scale and sustainability.

2. Market approaches to sanitation loans are important, but the evaluative criteria for performance should be rethought. 

3. It is important to consider modifying ecosan toilet designs or explore other cheaper but durable materials for construction.

Available from:

http://pubs.iied.org/10766IIED.html?c=urban