User:JustinePorto/Public toilets in Mali

Public toilets in Mali are called toilette, with around one per 100,000 people in the country. Squat toilets are the most common type, and they often charge to use. Efforts are underway to increase the total number of public toilets in the country.

Public toilets
A French speaking country, the local words for toilets include toilettes and WC, while the local word for toilet paper is Papier toilette, the word for men's toilet is hommes and the word for women's toilet is femmes.

A 2021 study found there was one public toilet per 100,000 people. Squat toilets are the most common style, and they rarely provide toilet paper.

The typical charge to use a public toilet is CFA25. Urinal usage is cheaper at CFA10, while showers cost around CFA50. People who run public toilet facilities typically earn around CFA300,000 to CFA600,000 a month. Most of the people who work at them are young people or women. A number are run by women's cooperatives. Rotary District 9101 District Governor Sunny Akoupha set a goal in March 2022 of building over 1,000 new public toilets between then and 2027. District 1190, which includes parts of Cumbria, Lancashire, Brampton and Longtown, offered to assist the Mali based project. The first twelve toilets scheduled to be constructed were to be built in Bamako. Others were planned for other cities in Mali, and in Senegal, Sierra Leone, Liberia and the Ivory Coast.

It cost around USD$0.04 to use a public toilet in 2007.

Regional and global situation impacting public toilets in Mali
Around 2.5 billion people around the world in 2018 did not have access to adequate toilet facilities. Around 4.5 billion people lacked access to proper sanitation. Public toilet access around the world is most acute in the Global South, with around 3.6 billion people, 40% of the world's total population, lacking access to any toilet facilities. 2.3 people in the the Global South do not have toilet facilities in their residence. Despite the fact that the United Nation made a declaration in 2010 that clean water and sanitation is a human right, little has been done in many places towards addressing this on a wider level.

Public toilets, depending on their design, can be tools of social exclusion. The lack of single-sex women's toilets in developing countries makes it harder for women to participate in public life, in education and in the workplace. In developing countries, unisex public toilets have been a disaster because they make women feel unsafe and fail to consider local religious beliefs. Across Africa, open defecation had social consequences. These included loss of dignity and privacy. It also put women at risk of sexual violence.

An issue in developing countries is toilet access in schools. Only 46% of schools in developing countries have them. Many schools around the world in 2018 did not have toilets, with the problem particularly acute in parts of Africa and Asia. Only one in five primary schools on earth had a toilet and only one in eight secondary schools had public toilets. 344 million children in sub-Saharan Africa did not have a toilet in their home in 2018. The lack of toilet access put these children at risk of water borne diseases.

There are generally two toilet styles in public bathrooms in Africa. One is a traditional squat toilet. The other is a western style toilet with bowl and a place to sit.