It’s been a while since the community of Alavanyo Agome have been able to work on their communal toilet block. But after purchasing all of the planking and having it delivered work can once again get started. There needs to be a cast concrete floor over the half of the septic tank to fit the squatting plate or situpon toilet. The first step is to fix shuttering to hold the poured concrete.

The carpenters have arrived to fix the shuttering on the septic tanks. This will allow Clemence to cast the very strong slabs in the cubicles. But just as they had the initial planking fitted the heavens opened and they were rained off.

Part one The Holding Tank

The Kumasi Ventilated Improved Pit latrine (KVIP) and is the epitome of sustainability. No water, and a lifespan of at least 20 years without any maintenance except cleaning of the cubicles. This is the type of sustainable toilet we have built in Tafi Atome, Alavanyo Dzogbedze and now are building in Alavanyo Agome.
The most important part is the Pit or the holding tanks. All of the toilet deposits go into these tanks.
They are designed to be very well ventilated so no, or little, smell goes back up into the cubicles. Any flies that follow their noses onto the poo are cunningly trapped in the tank until they die. If the flys could escape they would carry germs on their legs and bodies. They can’t excape so this stops them spreading diseases.
Each tank is designed to hold about ten years, YES TEN YEARS, worth of deposits! Then the second toilet in each cubicle is opened up to start filling the neighbouring holding tank. After about 20 years the contents of the first tank have thoroughly composted killing any pathogens. This holding tank is then emptied and the process starts again. The tanks need to be very strong to survive these many years of use.

The people of Alavanyo Agome have now started to line the pit that will form the base of the community latrine. Ladies carry water from a supply 200m away and sand from a stockpile 400m away. Using the smashed up rocks excavated from the pit, sand, cement and water the men mix the concrete by hand. Masons supplied by the village development committee then get to work. The first task is to get a level base. Getting this correct is vital for the strength of the whole construction. Because they are working directly on bed rock they do not need to dig foundations. The cement blocks that were made last year have cured and are really strong, but heavy!

All of this labour is provided by the village as their contribution to their community toilet.

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Digging the pit for the toilet block had ground to a halt because the soil was too compacted.
As they dug deeper the volunteers came to a layer of rock.
Pick axes made absolutely no impression despite the strength and commitment of the workers.
Drastic actions were called for.

The excavator worked all day long and into the night until finally the pit was ready.

This is what the finished pit looks like.
Nothing will be wasted, this heap of broken up rocks will be used for the concrete bases.
As in Alavanyo Dzogbedze, the larger rocks will be smashed up by hand to make the gravel.

The next stage of the project will be to line the pit using the blocks made earlier and put on the superstructure.
Clemence is discussing this next part of the project with the village volunteer masons.

Watch this space.

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For the last couple of weeks the community volunteers have been working on a water project for the village. But now they are back on the toilet block project. We really need to congratulate the workers who are still digging out the pit. When finished it will be 40′ by 10′ by 8′ deep (12m x 3m x 2.5m). That is about 100 tonnes of soil that needs digging out and as you can see it needs pickaxes to soften the laterite (the reddish iron and aluminium rich soil) .

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The hard work begins.

The pit for the pit latrine is measured out.
Here is Clemence Kitsi, Project Manager, carefully marking out the dimensions from the plans drawn up by the Kumasi Institute of Technology.

Then the ground breaking and back breaking work begins. Here are volunteers digging the pits.

Huge thanks to Ella Johnstone (9) who put this video together from photos and video clips supplied by Clemence Kitsi

Work is progressing very well. The first task after clearing the land is to make the cement blocks. 150 volunteers turned up to fetch and carry and mould the blocks.

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