Farmers in Uganda have started to use human urine as fertilizer for their crops. They have found the urine to be “first rate” in aiding plant growth, and especially handy for getting rid of banana pests. And fetilizer in Uganda can run $70 a bag, where pee costs nothing! Rose Nabirye, a farmer from Mayuge in eastern Uganda, says she was skeptical at first but after testing it has instucted all her family members to pee in jerrycans to supply the family farm.
Now wait: I already blogged about the wonders of the PeePoo bag for fertilizing family gardens. Two months ago the PeePoo was all the rage for transforming human waste, though there were concerns that people wouldn’t buy the biodegradable bags, choosing instead to dispose of feces in plastic shopping bags as they had always done. What happens if this middleman is eliminated entirely?
Do we sense a looming faceoff? Users of the PeePoo lined toe-to-toe in heavily fertilized gardens with those advocating the urine collection approach?
Let’s take a look at the players involved:
TEAM PEEPOO
Aqua4All, Holland
Ashoka
Baker McKenzie
BASF, Germany
Billerud Tenova, Sweden
FIMTech, Norway
GTZ Bangladesh
GTZ Ecosan, Germany
LOWE Brindfors, Sweden
Micro Water Facility, Holland
Price Waterhouse Coopers
Re:Public Relations, Sweden
Simavi, Holland
The Dutch Foreign Ministry, Holland
Tillväxtverket – Swedish Agency for Economic Growth, Sweden
Vinnova – Swedish Governmental Agency for Innovation Systems, Sweden
(So, Europe, pretty much. Led by the Dutch and the Swedes).
TEAM URINE
Red Cross
CARITAS
Ecological Sanitation (EcoSan)
Makerere University
The Finns
The Washington Post
New York Medical Center and Washington State University (and those Finns again)
Given the current lineup and the novelty of the pure urine approach, I’m inclined to give the edge to the PeePoo team. Plus the Finns only tested their approach on cabbage and sauerkraut.
