BRAC celebrates World Toilet Day 2013

Today is World Toilet Day, and the poor themselves are taking toilet matters into their own hands. See for yourself in the video above.

BRAC’s Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) Program, with major support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, seeks to combine entrepreneurship and community organization as a means to end the cycle of contamination and diseases associated with unsanitary latrines, contaminated water, and unsafe hygiene practices in 248 sub-districts of Bangladesh.

As part of the program, over 2,000 entrepreneurs  have received training on issues relating to sanitation entrepreneurship. Through a partnership with BRAC’s microcredit program, these entrepreneurs have the opportunities to access two interest-free loans of 10,000 Bangladeshi taka (about $130) to help kickstart their sanitation businesses.

Sanitation entrepreneurs with whom BRAC partners in Bangladesh are upgrading their inventories this year with sanitary latrine pans donated through American Standard’s Flush for Good campaign. Designed in Bangladesh, for the Bangladeshi slum and rural village market, these pans are a low-tech solution to reduce disease transmission by keeping flying insects out of otherwise open latrine pits. Learn more at FlushforGood.com.