User:JustinePorto/Public toilets in Mozambique

Public toilets in Mozambique are rare, as general access to toilets is also rare. Where there are public toilets, most are squat toilets unless in areas catering to Western tourists. Many families used communal toilets in multi-residence compounds and buildings. Some programs have been set up to try to reduce the lack of toilets on a household level.

Public toilets
choo is Swahili for toilet.

Around 89% of the population of Maputo lacked access to sewered toilet facilities. The average daily water usage per person between 1998-2002 was less than 50 liters a day. This limited the ability to use flush toilet systems in public toilets.

Maputo owned two desludging trucks in the mid-2010s, of which each was functional for about three months of the year. The city also had two main sewage trunks. Despite the Municipal Council having funding for streets and sanitation, much of the funding actually was diverted to street improvements. As a result, most of the toilet digging, maintenance and tank emptying was left to locals. In low-income districts like Nhlamankulu in Maputo, many multi-family residences shared common toilet areas. Many of these were pit latrines. These pit latrines were frequently unlined, had walls made of scrap material including corrugated iron, plastic sheeting, and lacked functional doors ensuring privacy.

SaniShop is a program created by the World Toilet Organization to empower local entrepreneurs and improve local toilet access by encouraging them to sell household latrines. Local masons are trained by SaniShop and provided with supplies to install the latrines in countries like Cambodia, India and Mozambique. Since 2012, the program has trained 550 local masons and resulted in the creation of 20,000 household latrine toilets.

There are public toilets in the Jardim 28 de Maio.

Regional and global situation impacting public toilets in Mozambique
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. Only a few places tend to have flush toilets with toilet seats. These include high end hotels and restaurants. Mid-range hotels and restaurants may have a toilet but no seat or may have a squat toilet.