Assessing the Demand for Plastic Latrine Slabs in Rural Kenya

Improving access to safe and affordable sanitation facilities is a global health priority that is essential for meeting the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals. To promote the use of improved sanitation in rural and low-income settings, plastic latrine slabs provide a simple option for upg...

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Autores principales: Peletz, Rachel, Kisiangani, Joyce, Ronoh, Patrick, Cock-Esteb, Alicea, Chase, Claire, Khush, Ranjiv, Luoto, Jill
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: The American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene 2019
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6726948/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31392946
http://dx.doi.org/10.4269/ajtmh.18-0888
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author Peletz, Rachel
Kisiangani, Joyce
Ronoh, Patrick
Cock-Esteb, Alicea
Chase, Claire
Khush, Ranjiv
Luoto, Jill
author_facet Peletz, Rachel
Kisiangani, Joyce
Ronoh, Patrick
Cock-Esteb, Alicea
Chase, Claire
Khush, Ranjiv
Luoto, Jill
author_sort Peletz, Rachel
collection PubMed
description Improving access to safe and affordable sanitation facilities is a global health priority that is essential for meeting the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals. To promote the use of improved sanitation in rural and low-income settings, plastic latrine slabs provide a simple option for upgrading traditional pit latrines. The International Finance Corporation/World Bank Selling Sanitation program estimated that plastic slabs would have a 34% annual growth, with a market size of US$2.53 million in Kenya by 2017. In this study, we examined the commercial viability of these plastic latrine slabs in rural Kenya by evaluating a financing and distribution model intervention, documenting household slab sales to date, and assessing consumer exposure and perceptions. We also determined household willingness to pay through a real-money auction with 322 households. We found that no households in our study area had purchased the plastic slabs. The primary barriers to slab sales were limited marketing activities and low demand compared with the sales price: households were willing to pay an average of US$5 compared with a market price of US$16. Therefore, current household demand for the plastic latrine slabs in rural Kenya is too low to support commercial distribution. Further efforts are required to align the price of plastic latrine slabs with consumer demand in this setting, such as additional demand creation, product financing, and public sector investment.
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spelling pubmed-67269482019-09-08 Assessing the Demand for Plastic Latrine Slabs in Rural Kenya Peletz, Rachel Kisiangani, Joyce Ronoh, Patrick Cock-Esteb, Alicea Chase, Claire Khush, Ranjiv Luoto, Jill Am J Trop Med Hyg Articles Improving access to safe and affordable sanitation facilities is a global health priority that is essential for meeting the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals. To promote the use of improved sanitation in rural and low-income settings, plastic latrine slabs provide a simple option for upgrading traditional pit latrines. The International Finance Corporation/World Bank Selling Sanitation program estimated that plastic slabs would have a 34% annual growth, with a market size of US$2.53 million in Kenya by 2017. In this study, we examined the commercial viability of these plastic latrine slabs in rural Kenya by evaluating a financing and distribution model intervention, documenting household slab sales to date, and assessing consumer exposure and perceptions. We also determined household willingness to pay through a real-money auction with 322 households. We found that no households in our study area had purchased the plastic slabs. The primary barriers to slab sales were limited marketing activities and low demand compared with the sales price: households were willing to pay an average of US$5 compared with a market price of US$16. Therefore, current household demand for the plastic latrine slabs in rural Kenya is too low to support commercial distribution. Further efforts are required to align the price of plastic latrine slabs with consumer demand in this setting, such as additional demand creation, product financing, and public sector investment. The American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene 2019-09 2019-08-05 /pmc/articles/PMC6726948/ /pubmed/31392946 http://dx.doi.org/10.4269/ajtmh.18-0888 Text en © The American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Articles
Peletz, Rachel
Kisiangani, Joyce
Ronoh, Patrick
Cock-Esteb, Alicea
Chase, Claire
Khush, Ranjiv
Luoto, Jill
Assessing the Demand for Plastic Latrine Slabs in Rural Kenya
title Assessing the Demand for Plastic Latrine Slabs in Rural Kenya
title_full Assessing the Demand for Plastic Latrine Slabs in Rural Kenya
title_fullStr Assessing the Demand for Plastic Latrine Slabs in Rural Kenya
title_full_unstemmed Assessing the Demand for Plastic Latrine Slabs in Rural Kenya
title_short Assessing the Demand for Plastic Latrine Slabs in Rural Kenya
title_sort assessing the demand for plastic latrine slabs in rural kenya
topic Articles
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6726948/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31392946
http://dx.doi.org/10.4269/ajtmh.18-0888
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