Chapter 4: Water GLOBAL GENDER AND ENVIRONMENT OUTLOOK Energy Chapter 2


sanitation and wastewater management are of basic importance not only for environmental sustainability, but also for gender equality. Sustainability is a particular challenge for sanitation and wastewater management systems, as wastewater disposal (including of raw sewage) is one of the major causes of water pollution.


On Menstrual Hygiene Day, Mera Parivar and The Helping Hand (THH) organized an awareness event with teenage school girls in Gurgaon, India. Photo Credit: © Mera Parivar NGO


Menstruating women who live in poverty frequently do not have access to safe sanitary materials, or to a clean and private place where they can change these materials, wash themselves, and dry the materials when they are re-used. Disposal of sanitary materials can be a health and environmental challenge where there is limited access to waste management systems (George 2013). For example, many schools do not provide appropriate waste receptacles.


Significant progress in regard to MHM has occurred as a result of community activism, which is breaking taboos and gaining popular and official attention. In 2015 a “Breaking the Silence” campaign in South Asia won a national media awareness award (Chanam 2015); in 2013 WASH United, an NGO, initiated a global Menstrual Hygiene Day on 28 May (Keiser 2013). Internet sites and social media can be used by women and girls in many countries to share experiences and participate in what has come to be called “menstrual activism” (Kutner 2014). Among other issues addressed, campaigns have recently been launched internationally, including in the United Kingdom and the European Union, demanding the removal of sales taxes from tampons and sanitary towels, which in the eyes of campaigners constitute a hidden surcharge on being a woman (BBC 2015b).


Sustainable sanitation and wastewater management


While 68 large-scale wastewater management and


treatment are often mistakenly perceived as not having gender dimensions, decision-making, technology choices, employment and impacts in this field are all gendered. Provision and management of sustainable


About 2.7 billion people use some type of local on-site sanitation system such as pit latrines or septic tanks, and the number is expected to increase to about 5 billion by 2030 (Strande et al. 2014). Local systems


The Sustainable Sanitation Alliance (SuSanA) has defined five sustainability criteria for sanitation management: it should be economically viable, socially acceptable, institutionally appropriate and technically appropriate, and it should protect human health as well as the environment and natural resources (SuSanA 2008). Long experience has shown that sustainability in sanitation and wastewater management requires more than toilets and infrastructure. It also requires social change in which women play a key role, together with reliable long-term financing, new or adapted institutional structures, monitoring and testing, and co-ordination and joint planning across government sectors including health, water, energy, agriculture and environment.


In many urban areas, especially small and medium- sized ones, wastewater infrastructure is wearing out or no longer appropriate. Construction and maintenance of centralized wastewater treatment systems is very expensive: it has been estimated that by 2025 the capital investment required for “modern” water and sewer systems globally will reach US$75 billion per year (Corcoran et al. 2010). In addition to high financial costs there are high environmental costs: water-borne sewerage systems rely on a regular supply of water (Corcoran et al. 2010). By 2050 at least one in four people is likely to live in a country affected by chronic or recurring shortages of fresh water (UN 2016). Estimates are that more than 80% of wastewater in developing countries is discharged untreated directly into rivers, lakes or the oceans (UN 2016; Corcoran et al. 2010). From the perspective of some municipal governments, dumping untreated wastewater and other types of pollution directly into waterways may seem a good short-term solution since the pollution is transferred to downstream communities. However, the health and environmental effects of such a strategy can be disastrous.


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