Sanitation workers – men, women and children engaged in the handling and management of human faecal matter across the globe– often face a myriad of challenges: exposure to health risks; inadequate safety protections; low, irregular pay; limited access to financial opportunities; or social stigma and discrimination.
Community members, researchers, activists, and policymakers are calling for increased attention to and resources for these workers, including the promotion of decent work; alternative skill development; improved conditions; and, in some cases, rehabilitation.
Numerous knowledge gaps remain about sanitation work globally, including information about workers’ everyday lives; effective forms of intervention; health and safety best practices; alternative livelihood options; and many other aspects of this labor force.
This forum aims to address some of these critical knowledge gaps by raising the visibility of sanitation workers and fostering discussion and collaboration between activism, research, policy and practice.
Objectives
1. Share knowledge and good practices about sanitation workers globally.
2. Build a community of practice that includes sanitation worker representatives, activists, policy makers, practitioners, students and academics.
3. Discuss and prioritize areas of research, policy and practice.
The OVERDUE team had the honour to contribute 3 presentations to the Sanitation Workers Forum. Recorded presentations are below 👇
Ndéye Penda Diouf from the Observatory Gender and Development of Saint Louis Senegal (OGDS) presented her reflections on “Women’s invisible work in the sanitation sector” based on her work in Saint Louis.
Angèle Koué (GEPALEF, Côte d’Ivoire), Jeannine Bola Ramarokoto (SiMIRALENTA, Madagascar) and Mina Rakotoarindrasata (Genre en Action, Madagascar) presented their films on women and the opportunities and constraints they face in the sanitation sector in Abidjan and Antananarivo
Festo Dominic Makoba (Center for Community Initiatives Tanzania) gave a talk titled “Building networks of sanitation workers from the ground up“. With CCI, he is training women and men to become sanitation workers, inventing and adapting technologies to deliver dignified sanitation, and supporting communities of practices.
More information
The Forum was superbly organized by an all-women voluntary committee of Masters, PhD students, early career researchers and professionals passionate about the topic of sanitation work.
More information: sanitationworkers2021@gmail.com & @SanWorkersForum
Further insights…
Check out @SanWorkersForum on Twitter to find out the latest updates and access the recorded sessions & Forum repository.
Catch up on Day 1 of the Sanitation Workers Forum thanks to Amita Bhakta & organizers’ take away blog post. First keynote from Bezwada Wilson from Safai Karmachari Andolan, working to eradicate manual scavenging in India, were followed by sessions on Marginalisation & Representation of Sanitation Workers, lessons learnt from India and Kenya, Histories of Sanitation Work, and pre-recorded conversations between Dr. Hemangi Kadlak & Dr. Sally Cawood, and Dr CS Sharada Prasad and Dr. Jen Barr.
Catch up on Day 2 👉, which brought together Ibra Sow (President of the Pan-African Association of Sanitation Actors, PASA, Sénégal) and Alidou Bandé (President of ABASE Manual Pit Emptiers Association, Burkina Faso), emphasis on understanding the role of identity (intersections of gender, caste, age) for individual sanitation workers, and discussions on the COVID-19 context and occupational health and safety.
