Innovative Approach for the Management of Faecal Sludge Accumulated in Ventilated Improved Pit Latrine: A Case Study of eThekwini Municipality in Durban South Africa

The provision of sustainable sanitation service to all South Africans has become one of the government national priorities. This is because the government recognizes that all citizens of the country has the right to basic sanitation that is affordable, appropriate, socially acceptable and sustainable in the long run. Ventilated Improved Pit latrines (VIP) has been considered to be the minimum acceptable level of sanitation service. However, the provision of appropriate sanitation service in the form of VIP latrines to all goes beyond building the toilets, plans should be put in place by municipalities are for adequate operation and maintenance of the toilets before and when the toilets reaches their capacity. Major challenges faced by many of this municipalities which is also common in many developing countries is that, this on-site sanitation systems eventually becomes full to their capacity and if there is no long-term maintenance plan in place, this system becomes unusable and eventually leaves the household without an effective basic sanitation system again. This paper present innovative approaches that have been considered for the operation and maintenance of Ventilated Improved Pit latrine in and around eThekwini Municipality in Durban, South Africa.