Waste as Business: Emerging Ugandan micro- and Small-sized Businesses in Resource Recovery and safe Reuse

This paper highlights local experiences, opportunities and common challenges faced by micro- and small-sized businesses in Resource Recovery and Reuse (RRR) - with a special focus on briquette making businesses from faecal sludge and other household waste. The study enlisted the potential that RRR has in preserving the environment through through hybrid business models in sanitation. It used field methods of identifying businesses and providing them with business development support, while testing the potential to become sustainable faecal sludge enterprises. The findings indicated that the small businesses still face several challenges in integrating faecal sludge into the business models profitably. We recommend high level attention by government, academic institutions and entrepreneurs for policy, research and management innovations. This will have a combined benefit of sanitation improvement as well as having entrepreneurial innovations and business growth from waste. •Charcoal is a key source of domestic energy for cooking in Uganda.•There are initiatives to use faecal sludge for a potential briquettes market.•The faecal sludge innovations are limited by technological and social factors.•Joint effort needed by government and private players to support faecal sludge use.