In developing countries, human waste is often left out in the open or funneled into the ocean, where it contaminates the water supply—leading to thousands of deaths each year due to gastrointestinal diseases. That’s beginning to change after an alliance of companies like Unilever and nonprofits like The World Bank have come together to launch The Toilet Accelerator, an initiative aimed at providing business support to emerging sanitation entrepreneurs in the developing world. The initiative began by helping companies manufacture toilets at scale, but now they are working with sanitation companies to turn human waste into a “resource” that can be effectively reused. At one sanitation company in Ghana, dried fecal waste is being mixed with organic waste to be converted into biogas that fuels electricity generators.
The developing world is turning its poop problem into a resource
More of Today's Solutions
More US states and cities are boosting minimum wages in 2026. What does it me...
BY THE OPTIMIST DAILY EDITORIAL TEAM As the federal minimum wage remains frozen at $7.25 an hour, unchanged since 2009, cities and states across ...
Read More3 organization hacks for Type B brains that actually work
BY THE OPTIMIST DAILY EDITORIAL TEAM Scroll through any productivity blog or time-management book, and you’ll find a familiar formula: rigid routines, detailed planners, ...
Read MoreAn easy hack to counteract the harmful health effects of sitting all day
Humans are not designed to spend the entire day seated. Nonetheless, billions of us do it at least five days per week, as Western ...
Read MoreEnsuring no pet goes hungry: The rise of pet food banks in the UK
Pete Dolan, a cat owner, recalls the tremendous help he received from Animal Food Bank Support UK, a Facebook organization that coordinates volunteer community ...
Read More
