Artisans and landlords have been called upon to build credibility with financial institutions to enable them access loans to construct toilet facilities in homes.
Mr Stephen Ntow, Director of WASHealth Solution gave the advice at a day?s forum for artisans and entrepreneurs organised by Hope for Future Generations (HFFG), a non-governmental organisation.
He said this would go a long way to reduce open defecation in communities and by extension minimise diseases.
The forum was under the auspices of Ghana-Netherlands WASH Programme (GNWP) on sanitation, which was attended by key stakeholders in sanitation and persons from financial institutions.
It was sponsored by UKaid of Britain, Ghana Health Service, Youth Development, Research and Innovation Centre and Institute of Social Research and Development.
They discussed among other things, the pitfalls in sanitation market, enabling environment for sanitation market opportunities and the potential market available for entrepreneurs to tap into.
Mr Ntow urged artisans to package their work well to attract landlords and banks, to support their activities.
Madam Cecilia Senu, Executive Director of HFFG said open defecation is the major cause of diseases and that as a country being assisted by donors we need to be responsible.
She said the forum was to build the capacity of sanitation players for them to impact on landlords to provide more toilet facilities in their homes to mitigate the attitude of open defecation in the communities.
?There is the need for a behavoural change by Ghanaians towards the environment to reduce diseases,? she advised.
She said HFFG had partnered the GNWP to implement strategies and activities on a survey conducted on open defecation in five metropolitan and municipal areas in the country namely Cape Coast, Komenda-Edina-Eguafo-Abrem, Ga South, Ga West and Ga Central.
?This is to reduce open defecation by 70 per cent in the areas.? Madam Senu said.
The HFFG improves the education, health and socio-economic status of women, children and communities through participatory and sustainable processes by using community resources.
GNA
