The RRR Approach

Water Supply and Sanitation Crises

Although 2.1 billion people gained access to clean drinking water since the year 1990, today still about 800 million people live without adequate access to safe drinking water and some 2.4 billion people – one-third of the world’s population – will remain without access to improved sanitation in 2015 (WHO and UNICEF 2013).

With freshwater either unavailable or too expensive and wastewater treatment not keeping up with urban growth, urban farmers often have no alternative but to use highly polluted water. Many of them belong to the urban poor who depend on agricultural activities as a source of income and employment generation as well as food security. Globally about 20 million hectares of agricultural land is irrigated with polluted water (i.e. direct use of raw or untreated wastewater, direct use of treated wastewater, as well as indirect use of untreated wastewater (SCHEIERLING ET AL. 2010).

Solid Waste Management Challenge

Global urban Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) production, which has nearly doubled in the last 10 years, is projected to double again in the next 15 years, increasing from 1.3 billion tons a year in 2010 to 2.2 billion tons a year in 2025 as the number of people living in cities increases from 3 billion to 4.3 billion. In lownd middle-income countries it is common that 30% ‒60% of all the urban solid waste is uncollected and less than 50% of the population is served (HOORNWEG and BHADA-TATA 2012). The commonplace open dumping of waste presents a real threat to the environment and to human health. This waste is rich in water, nutrients and energy. Yet, waste is not being managed in a way that permits to derive value from its resources. Meanwhile, millions of smallholders in low-income countries struggle with depleted soils (see also Nutrient Cycle), lack of water and limited access to energy.

Energy and Food Insecurity

The past decades have seen an increasing water use for food and energy production (see also The Energy System) to meet the demands of a growing population. While food insecurity – globally almost 870 million people, or one in eight, are suffering from chronic undernourishment (FAO 2013) – is a growing concern all over the world, there is little recognition that 70% of the world’s freshwater withdrawals are already committed to irrigated agriculture and that even more water will be needed to meet increasing demands for food and energy (biofuels) in future. By 2025, water withdrawals (see also Water Cycle) are predicted to increase from current levels by 50% in developing countries, and by 18% in developed countries (UNEP 2007).

More than 1.4 billion people worldwide have no access to electricity, and 1 billion more only have intermittent access. Over 2.5 billion people rely on traditional biomass to cook meals and heat homes (UNFOUNDATION 2013), exposing themselves and their families to smoke and fumes that damage their health and kill nearly two million people a year. More than 95% of these people are either in sub-Saharan Africa or developing Asia.

Resource Recovery and Safe Reuse Approach

All these failures have dramatic consequences for the environment, public health and development and thus seriously undermine progress towards achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which aim at diminishing poverty and increasing health and the general wellbeing of all people.

A fundamental pillar of Integrated Natural Resources Management (INRM) is the Resource Recovery and Reuse (RRR) of nutrients, water, organic matter and energy from otherwise wasted resources. RRR promotes a paradigm shift in solid and liquid waste management from treatment for disposal to treatment for reuse based on research on generic RRR Business Models at different scales. Recovering nutrients, water and energy from domestic and agro-industrial waste streams is gaining momentum in low-income countries where the sanitation sector is traditionally heavily subsidized and continuously struggles with the provision of basic sanitation services. However, RRR offers significant value beyond “ecological benefits” by offering viable options for cost recovery in the sanitation sector and business opportunities that attract private capital. Both processes can be game changers in the sanitation-agriculture interface if the underlying business models are sustainable and can be scaled up.