Harpic partners City Planning Ministry to improve access to sanitation
Harpic, in collaboration with the Ministry of City Planning & Water Supply, will install toilets in 100 homes across the island this year, under a new program that aims to improve access to sanitation facilities throughout Sri Lanka.
The first phase of the program will see households in the western province receiving financial and technical support to build a toilet at each premises. The countrywide programme will be sponsored by Harpic, Sri Lanka’s leading toilet cleaning agent. Our mission is to provide sanitation facilities to every home in Sri Lanka,” said Hon. Sudarshani Fernandopulle, State Minister of City Planning & Water Supply. “A clean lavatory is something most people cherish but often take for granted. And many families across Sri Lanka live in their homes without toilets. With support provided by Harpic, we have identified households across the country that lack basic sanitation facilities, and will provide the funds and technical support needed to build a toilet for each family.
Inadequate sanitation standards and soiled lavatories is a recurrent issue that troubles most developing countries. In a report published by World Health Organization (WHO), Sri Lanka’s sanitation coverage was rated ‘best in South Asia’. Yet, WHO estimates that two million people remain without such coverage. A stark reminder of why faecal matter still pollutes national waterways, while the number of dysentery cases — a faecal-oral highly transmissible water-borne disease — remain unchanged. The team behind Harpic has visited more than 250,000 homes — each year — over the past 10 years, promoting good hygiene and sanitation practices in order to eradicate hygiene related illnesses such as diarrhoea and dysentery.
“In the past 10 years, Harpic has encouraged over 250,000 households annually, to practice proper sanitation habits. Surprisingly, our on-ground engagement with residents suggested that while some households still choose to practice open defecation, which contributes to heavy water pollution and water-borne diseases, a significant number of households in residential areas had contaminated lavatories or none at all,” said Sinclair Cruise, Sri Lanka Commercial Director for Reckitt Benckiser.