Research Paper When is shared sanitation acceptable in low-income urban settlements? A user perspective on shared sanitation quality in Kumasi, Kisumu and Dhaka Vasco Schelbert, Dario Meili, Mahbub-Ul Alam, Sheillah Simiyu, Prince Antwi-Agyei , Kwaku Amaning Adjei, Bismark Dwumfour-Asare , Mahbubur Rahman, Sharika Ferdous, Supta Sarker, Isabel Günther and Christoph Lüthi ABSTRACT Shared sanitation facilities (SSFs) have contributed considerably to sanitation access in many low- income settlements. While many SSFs are of unacceptable quality, others have been found to be a hygienically safe and a socially and economically viable sanitation option. Within its framework, the WHO/UNICEF Joint Monitoring Programme (JMP), evaluating progress on the Sustainable Development Goals, considers shared sanitation as ‘limited sanitation’. Overall, there is uncertainty about the criteria to distinguish between unacceptable and acceptable quality of SSF. In our study, we used a user- centred qualitative approach in low-income urban settlements in Kumasi (Ghana), Kisumu (Kenya) and Dhaka (Bangladesh) and conducted 17 focus group discussions to evaluate how SSF users define the quality of an SSF and which aspects they consider as essential priorities for good-quality SSF. In descending order, the user priorities identified are: immediate water access, cleanliness, gender- separated toilets, flush toilets, lighting for use at night, lockable/functional doors, tiling, handwashing stations and privacy. This list can serve as input to the sanitation guidelines, local building codes and the establishment of minimum national sanitation standards. SSFs that meet these minimal criteria can then be promoted as an incremental step when individual household facilities are not feasible. Key words | low-income urban settlements, monitoring, quality, shared sanitation, Sustainable Development Goal 6, user-centred qualitative approach HIGHLIGHTS • Previous research has identified user acceptability aspects for adequate sanitation. Very little research has been done which aspects users prioritise. • No research has been done that qualitatively collected priorities of users of shared sanitation facility (SSF) in the context of low-income urban settlements and, at the same time, evaluated the prioritisation by SSF users across different contexts. Vasco Schelbert (corresponding author) Christoph Lüthi Department Sanitation, Water and Solid Waste for Development, Eawag – Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology, Überlandstrasse 133, 8600 Dübendorf, Switzerland E-mail: vasco.schelbert@eawag.ch Dario Meili Isabel Günther Nadel Center for Development and Cooperation, ETH Zürich, Clausiusstrasse 37, 8092 Zürich, Switzerland Mahbub-Ul Alam Mahbubur Rahman Sharika Ferdous Supta Sarker Infectious Disease Division, Environmental Interventions Unit, icddr,b, 68, Shaheed Tajuddin Ahmed Sarani, Mohakhali, Dhaka 1212, Bangladesh Sheillah Simiyu African Population and Health Research Center, PO Box 10787-00100, Nairobi, Kenya Prince Antwi-Agyei Regional Centre of Energy and Environmental Sustainability (RCEES), Civil and Environmental Engineering Department, School of Engineering, University of Energy and Natural Resources (UENR), PO Box 214, Sunyani, Ghana Kwaku Amaning Adjei Civil Engineering Department, College of Engineering, KNUST, Kumasi, Ghana This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Licence (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0), which permits copying and redistribution for non-commercial purposes with no derivatives, provided the original work is properly cited (http://creativecommons.org/ licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). 959 Research Paper © 2020 The Authors Journal of Water, Sanitation and Hygiene for Development | 10.4 | 2020 doi: 10.2166/washdev.2020.084 Downloaded from http://iwaponline.com/washdev/article-pdf/10/4/959/828986/washdev0100959.pdf by LIB4RI E-RESOURCES user on 25 February 2021