While building a latrine one will need an investment of around Rs 29, 100 (USD 396) per latrine, the annual benefit due to a latrine can be in the range of Rs 53,500 for per household, stated a report. Many households in various parts of India started building toilets after a major campaign, Swachh Bharat Mission was launched in October 2014, considered as the world’s largest sanitation campaign.
The report revealed, “Investment costs average USD 396 per latrine and average annual operational costs are USD 37 (financial) and USD 94 (time costs). Annual benefits of USD 727 per household are mainly from savings associated with reduced diarrhoea incidence (55 per cent) and from sanitation access time savings (45 per cent).”
This pricing was arrived at after the cost-benefit model inputs were obtained from household surveys in 4,45,452 villages from 4,770 blocks in 12 states that once contributed to over 90 per cent of open defecation in India. These 12 states are Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Odisha, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Telangana and Uttar Pradesh.
The total investment cost of a latrine averaged USD 396 as a combination of government (USD 127) and household investments (USD 257 expenses and USD 11 for time). The investment on toilets is for building and maintaining toilets, whereas benefits are from reductions in medical costs and mortality associated with diarrheal diseases, productive time saved from fewer diarrhoea cases and accessing outside defecation options, and increase in the property value of having a toilet.
More than two-thirds (69.5 per cent) of households received government subsidy with an average USD 183 support, and of these households, 63.8 per cent made their own investment to supplement the government subsidy, which averaged an additional USD 154.
