Transforming waste into productive resources has long been held up as a huge economic opportunity while eliminating (or at least substantially reducing) the harmful effects of unsafely managed waste on human health and the environment.

“But, while well understood in principle, in practice, these benefits have yet to be realized at scale,” said Cheryl Hicks, executive director & CEO, Toilet Board Coalition (TBC), as she brought out a report ‘Make Way for the Future of Sanitation’. The report in association with EY sheds light on the means to monetize toilet resources among other business solutions for sanitation and hygiene. TBC is a business-led partnership and platform that aims to address the global sanitation crisis by accelerating the sanitation economy.

Elaborating about the prospects of monetizing toilet resources, she said that the principle of ‘waste-to-resource’ applies to far more than just physical resources. It also applies to the vast amounts of information and insight that can be gleaned from people’s use of sanitation facilities and how that can be put to productive use. “It not only in the service of sanitation enterprises fine-tuning their strategies and operations but also of cities, municipalities and governments implementing more integrated waste management strategies and more effective public health campaigns. Creating a more robust market for renewable resources, data and information flows could dramatically accelerate the pace of change needed to achieve SDG6. Sanitation enterprises making the most significant progress on this front illustrate three critical pathways to scale.” SDG6 is one of 17 Sustainable Development Goals established by the UN General Assembly in 2015. It calls for clean water and sanitation for all people.

Also Read: Sanitation is the New Growth Engine