Free basic sanitation services – South African experience

The paper sets out an analysis of eight case studies investigating the approaches used by a range of metro, district and local municipalities to provide free basic sanitation services in South Africa. The study focussed on free basic sanitation policies, funding arrangements, integration of health and hygiene education, poverty reduction, operation and maintenance plans for dry on-site sanitation systems and methods used to target the poor.

The paper sets out the findings of the study, namely that most municipalities are implementing free basic sanitation services as part of a package of free basic services provided to the registered indigent households. A few municipalities are providing free basic sanitation services to all households that are connected to sewer networks irrespective of their socio-economic status. Health and hygiene education is provided during the implementation of basic sanitation infrastructure and only a few municipalities are providing health and hygiene education as a service. Most municipalities are installing VIP toilets on a large scale without any plans for emptying the pits when the toilets are full and this is posing a threat to the long-term sustainability of free basic sanitation services. However, a few municipalities showed innovation in their approach to the planning of sustainable basic sanitation services for poor rural communities.

The paper concludes that the provision of free basic sanitation services to all households connected to the sewer networks is not financially sustainable because of poor cost recovery, and that the majority of the poor are not benefiting from free basic sanitation services because they lack access to basic sanitation infrastructure .

[Paper to be presented at the IRC symposium Sanitation for the Urban Poor, Delft, The Netherlands, 19 - 21 November 2008]