Applications are open for the SanTech Hackathon 2024

Greywater Recycling for Sustainable Small Scale Agriculture 

Apply Now

Meet Edwin Mariita, Winner – with the Opero Services team – of our SanTech Hackathon 2020

Edwin Mariita and his team from Opero Services won the first and the second prize in our 2020 Santech Hackathon. They convinced the jury with two sanitation innovations that significantly reduce the cost of constructing and maintaining a sanitation system in rural contexts.

In Western Kenya, where Opero Services is based, safe sanitation coverage remains low. The high maintenance costs of traditional pit latrines, which need frequent desludging, is one the factors contributing to this situation: households tend to not set enough money aside for desludging and toilets become unusable over time.

The vetiver latrine, designed by Edwin and his team, tackle this challenge by offering a green and circular toilet design. The innovation, equipped with a SATO pan, safely contains and treats human waste, while at the same time reusing the nutrients and liquids contained in the waste to feed a bed of vetiver grass, a much-appreciated by-product, used by many Kenyan households as cattle feed and for thatching.  Edwin and his team also designed some recycled plastic moulds that significantly reduce the cost of building toilets.

Watch our short video clip or listen to the full-length interview with Erwin Mariita (below) to learn more about these brilliant innovations!

 

Listen to the full-length interview with Edwin Mariita:

 

Watch the full-length interview with Edwin Mariita:

Please share