[Kids, helping out]

The research done in Haiti, in collaboration with SOIL (Sustainable Organic Integrated Livelihoods), aimed to test the efficacy of ecological sanitation in decreasing disease and enhancing soil fertility in rural Haiti, both critical factors in promoting human well-being. Ecological sanitation is a multidisciplinary community-based approach which has the potential to improve public health, increase household income and agricultural productivity, mitigate environmental degradation and provide low cost sanitation for rural communities. An ecological sanitation system is defined as a system that makes use of sanitized human excreta and turns it into a resource which can be introduced into agriculture to supplement soil fertility replacing synthetic fertilizers, which are often inaccessible to poor subsistence farmers.

Proper composting of human wastes reduces pollution to the environment and minimizes the potential for disease resulting from fecal pathogens. The use of sanitized human wastes in agricultural systems can significantly boost agricultural productivity. Haiti is the only nation in the Western Hemisphere in which the majority of citizens subsist as small farmers.

The recycling of human wastes for agricultural use has the potential to harness the ecosystem service of nutrient recycling to reduce malnutrition and increase farmer income, while simultaneously providing badly needed sanitation services that are cost effective and environmentally sound.

[Assembling one of the toilets]	[All ready to go!]