Advocate to Replicate Smart Practices on Faecal Sludge Management in Municipalities
Mr. Saydul Karim Mintu, Mayor of Jenaidah (centre) who has been instrumental in setting up good policies on FSM in place.
UCLG ASPAC has proceeded the Municipality Network Policy and Advocacy Project to the next level. UCLG ASPAC and MAB visited Jhenaidah, one of municipalities in Bangladesh that has successfully implemented a full cycle of Faecal Sludge Management (FSM) facility from the initial source up to final end product. This visit has given enlightenment to the next step of the Project which reflects to a plan of conducting advocacy to the society and high-level officials. Implementation of FSM facility in Jhenaidah is far advance compared to other municipalities in Bangladesh. The fact is inseparable from strong commitment of a Mayor who formulated good policies to materialise the commitment and also supported by hard work of senior officials under his leadership. The Municipality has made a good collaboration with private company using the public-private financing mechanism. For the operation and maintenance of the facility, for example, the cooperation manages to regulate private company to be responsible for the operation of the desludging service truck, while the operation of faecal sludge treatment facility is managed by the Municipality. From the collaboration, the private company could deliver up to six containers of faecal sludge to the treatment facility. Besides, the private company also collects retribution from communities for the service which is used to finance their operation and maintenance costs and to pay small amount of cost to discharge the sludge to the FSM
facility managed by the Municipality. The collected truck retribution is used by the Municipality for operation and maintenance of the FSM facility and, in longer term, for investment to procure another new sludge container truck, therefore, increases the level of quality of the service. The Municipality has also emphasised the implementation of national policy that is a once a year desludging activity for each faecal sludge container in each household/building. Municipality Network Policy and Advocacy is a project of UCLG ASPAC with the support of Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The project aims at advocating local governments in cities of Bangladesh and Nepal to implement sanitation policy.
Best practice on Faecal Sludge Management in Jhenaidah Municipality in Bangladesh.