In this next edition of the SDGs series (with SouthAsia@LSE & Africa@LSE), the authors examine the global sanitation crisis in India, with a study on the determinants of toilet acquisition. Toilets represent an unlikely status symbol for households, and new findings suggest that household’s may see toilets acquisition as a means of improving the marriage prospects of their sons.

This post forms part of a cross-blog series on the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development run by the IGC, Africa at LSE, and South Asia at LSE blogs. View more posts in this series.

IGC – Ensuring access and availability of clean water and sanitation for all has been marked as the 6^th Goal in the new UN Sustainable Development agenda. Within this goal, bringing an end to open-defecation is significant target, not only for its expected wide-ranging implications on community health, but because of its potential knock-on effects on education and welfare of women and girls in vulnerable. In India, open-defecation remains one of the biggest sanitation challenges today. While ‘moderate’ progress has been achieved figures show that over the last 20 years, there has been very little reduction in open defecation amongst the poor (ibid.). Assuming that the characteristic profile of the households that currently build toilets remains unchanged, back-of-the-envelope calculations suggest that the Government of India, would “have to construct 81 toilets per minute – day and night – starting 1 January 2015 to meet its goal of eliminating open defecation by the end of 2019, or 41 toilets per minute to meet the United Nation’s goal of eliminating open defecation by 2025”. Tiếp tục đọc “No toilet, no bride: The unlikely link between private toilets and marriage market outcomes in India” →