Water, sanitation and hygiene situation in public primary schools in the Department of Man, Western Côte d'Ivoire Open Access

Safely managed water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) services are essential to human well-being, so much so that equitable access to these services was recognized as a human right by the United Nations General Assembly in 2010 and reaffirmed by the Human Rights Council in the same year. However, access to these facilities remains inadequate in many parts of the world, particularly in developing countries (Adams et al. 2009; WHO 2018; UNICEF & WHO 2020). This situation particularly affects the very young, especially children under 15, who pay the heaviest price due to their greater vulnerability (WHO 2018; McMichael 2019).

Unsafe water supplies and poor sanitation and hygiene are at the root of many environmental diseases such as diarrhoea and typhoid (Adams et al. 2009; Kim et al. 2023). These conditions are responsible for 88% of diarrhoeal diseases in developing countries, and the lack of handwashing facilities and contaminants in water (e.g. lead and arsenic) make these risks high in schools. In fact, helminth infections can affect children's ability to learn in school and impair their cognitive development. In addition, the impact of illness on teachers can reduce their performance and increase absenteeism, which has a direct impact on learning and teachers' work. Girls and boys, as well as those with disabilities, are likely to be affected differently by inadequate WASH conditions in schools, which can contribute to unequal learning opportunities. Of course, the lack of adequate, separate, private and safe toilets and sanitation facilities can lead to girls and people with disabilities missing school days or even dropping out of education (Adams et al. 2009; McMichael 2019).

With this in mind, school environments in developing countries are increasingly attracting the attention of governments and international agencies to ensure the well-being of school-age children who spend most of their days there. Hutton & Haller (2004) estimated that 1.9 billion school days could be gained by meeting the Millennium Development Goals on safe water and sanitation and reducing the incidence of diarrhoeal diseases. As a result, diseases related to the lack of WASH and their consequences represent an enormous burden in many developing countries, particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa, especially in the education sector (UNICEF & WHO 2020).

In Côte d'Ivoire, after a decade of conflictual political crisis (2002–2011) that ended in a deadly civil war in 2011, the state has made remarkable economic and social progress to bring the country out of its recent tragic past by restoring peace and order (Oyeniran 2017; Babo 2019). At the same time, due to the large number of internally displaced persons (IDPs) caused by the crisis, the government has had to make enormous efforts to improve school enrolment, the impact of which is very noticeable. A large number of schools have been built and teachers recruited, with a policy of free tuition and the distribution of school kits. This has helped to increase the enrolment rate by 1.7% per year from 2016 to 2019, with 4% in rural areas and 1.2% in urban areas (MENETFP & DSPS 2020). This sustained increase in enrolment is in line with the government's stated goal of giving all children aged 6–16 the opportunity to benefit from quality basic education.

At the same time, steps have been taken to improve the school environment through the WASH approach, which aims to provide schools with drinking water, basic sanitation and hygiene education in the school environment (WHO 2018; MENETFP & DSPS 2020). According to MENET (2017), only 39% of public primary schools had drinking water points in 2016, with a lower proportion (27%) in rural areas compared with 61% in urban areas. The proportion of pre-primary and primary schools without functional sanitation facilities was 36.1 and 52.7%, respectively. In terms of access to hygiene at school, 80.3% of primary schools did not have handwashing facilities. This percentage rose to 87.1% in rural primary schools, compared with 69.2% in urban schools (UNICEF_CI 2020). However, despite the work of Kouakou et al. (2021a, b) and Kouamé et al. (2021) in schools in the west, north and centre-south of the country, respectively, there is to date no scientific data to assess the type and quality of WASH services available in the country's schools. However, the lack of national standards, particularly for WASH in schools in Côte d'Ivoire, allows for a wide variety of interventions and installations in terms of WASH approaches and technologies in schools (Adams et al. 2009; UNICEF_CI 2020). Under these conditions, the different technologies and infrastructures introduced by the many actors, interventions and funding sources are likely to raise questions about the management and maintenance of WASH infrastructure in schools. Facilities in schools could be abandoned soon after commissioning due to the lack of effective management and maintenance mechanisms.

According to the report on the statistical analysis of the education system for 2019–2020, the increase in the number of pupils in state primary education by administrative region reveals regional disparities behind the 1.7% increase at the national level. The northern regions (Tchologo (4.8%), Béré (4.6%), Poro (4%)) and the western regions (Tonkpi (2.8%), Guémon (2.4%), Cavally (2.2%)) recorded the highest increases, above the national average (MENETFP & DSPS 2020). However, due to the effects of the decade-long socio-political crisis, which were particularly felt in the west of the country, especially in the Tonkpi region, the latter, like other regions of the country, has benefited from a number of initiatives and approaches. These include the ‘child-friendly school’ and the ‘3-star approach to WASH in schools’, launched by the government with support from international organizations and donors (MENETFP & DSPS 2020; UNICEF_CI 2020). These approaches deserve to be evaluated and analysed, especially in rural areas recovering from the ravages of the political crisis, so that lessons can be learned to improve the management of existing and future facilities.

This study examines WASH services in state (i.e. government-run) primary schools in the Department of Man. The main objectives were to (i) determine the number of pupils and teachers in schools by sex, (ii) assess the availability of water points and handwashing facilities, (iii) describe latrines (i.e. date of construction, type, hygiene, functionality and donors) and (iv) assess the level of cleanliness (i.e. waste management) in public primary schools in the Department of Man.

All primary schools in the department are managed by five Inspectorates of Primary Education (IPE) under the authority of the Regional Education Office of Man. These are the IPE Man Koko, the IPE Man-Doyagouiné, the IPE Man Libreville, located in the city of Man, the IPE Logoualé and the IPE Sangouiné, located in the sub-prefectures of Logoualé and Sangouiné, respectively.

The distances between the city of Man and the capitals of the department's sub-prefectures are 9.1 km (Bogouiné), 13 km (Gbangbégouiné-Yati), 15 km (Fagnampleu), 15.7 km (Ziogouiné), 19.6 km (Zagoué), 32 km (Sangouiné), 33 km (Sandougou-Soba), 39.5 km (Logoualé), 54 km (Podiagouiné) and 73.1 km (Yapleu).

This study covers public schools that are under the state's responsibility and located in the capitals of 11 sub-prefectures of the Department of Man.

In 2023, the Department of Man's capitals had a total of 158 state primary and pre-primary schools, with 124 primary schools and 34 pre-primary schools divided into 36 school groups and 10 single primary schools (Table 1). In this study, a school group is an institution that has at least two schools in the same location, either with or without a pre-primary section.

In order to carry out this study as effectively as possible and to achieve its objectives, a technical meeting was held to launch the study between the Man Regional Department of National Education (RDNE) and the research team. The meeting provided an opportunity to present the study to the local authorities responsible for national education and literacy, and to obtain information on the number of primary and pre-primary establishments in the capitals of the sub-prefectures of the Man Department.

The research team was then directed to the Primary Education Inspectorates (PEI) in the Department of Man, with whom contact was made with the directors of the state primary and pre-primary schools in the various localities, and the research activities were then synchronized. Meetings were held in the target schools between July and August 2023 with the heads of the primary and pre-primary schools and the chairmen of the management committees of the said schools in the various localities (Supplementary material, Figure S1).

The actual data collection consisted of interviews with key informants (i.e. head teachers and chairpersons of school management committees) to obtain information on school enrolment (i.e. pupils and teachers by gender), availability of water points and latrines, date of construction of latrines, donors and functionality of latrines, maintenance of latrines, state of hygiene and waste management in schools, and teachers' impressions of the sanitation infrastructure in their schools.

In addition, guided visits were carried out after the interviews to make field observations (condition of latrines, location of dustbins, final disposal of waste, state of hygiene of areas, etc.) and to assess the overall state of sanitation in the schools. During these visits, photographs and geographical coordinates of schools, water points and latrines were taken to illustrate the situations observed.

The director of Man's National Education Office in Côte d'Ivoire approved the use of the database collected from different schools in his district, especially in the administrative centres of the 11 sub-prefectures that make up the Department of Man.

The original file was anonymous.

The number of pupils in all public primary schools in the capitals of the Man Department's sub-prefectures was 31,824, including 15,324 girls and 16,500 boys, i.e. 48.15% girls (Table 2). There were 841 teachers, 494 males and 347 females, i.e. 41.3% females. However, the proportion of girls varied between 41.5 and 50%, with an average of 46.7%. The proportion of female teachers ranged from 0 (Sandougou-Soba) to 51.4% (Sangouiné), with an average of 30.6% (Supplementary material, Table S1 and Figure S2). The fact that the number of girls in school is almost equal to the number of boys shows the impact of the government's policy to encourage girls to go to school. In March 2018, Côte d'Ivoire adopted a strategic plan to accelerate girls' education, which aims to strengthen efforts to promote girls' education in the country. Raising awareness of the need for girls to attend school has borne fruit, with the girls/boys parity index increasing from 0.86 in 2011 to 0.99 in 2018 and 0.91 in 2021 in primary schools (UNESCO 2022; Kattan et al. 2023). However, the results of the present study in the Department of Man indicate a gender parity index of 0.93 (i.e. 15,324 girls/16,500 boys), which is high and, nevertheless, in the same order of magnitude as the national average reported by UNESCO (2022) and Kattan et al. (2023). This high number of girls means that concrete measures must be taken to ensure that they stay in school, in particular by combating all forms of violence against girls and improving WASH services in schools (Wortsman et al. 2024). On the other hand, the relatively low proportion of female teachers in the department, apart from the fact that nationally women have a lower literacy rate (43.4%) than men (54.8%), can be explained by environmental conditions (mountainous area). For example, the sub-prefecture of Sandougou-Soba, where no women have been employed to date, is located at an altitude of over 900 m, with poor access conditions (the road is in very poor condition and impassable after rain) (Koffi et al. 2021). However, a strong presence of women among the teachers could contribute to good supervision of young girls, especially in education on personal hygiene, especially during menstruation (Sommer et al. 2017).

Regarding the availability of latrines in schools, the majority of school groups (86.1%) have them, unlike single schools where only 30% have them, similar to the findings of Melaku et al. (2023). This result could lead to the practice of open defecation in most (70%) of the single schools without latrines. However, this situation could increase the risks associated with open defecation in schools, as some studies, such as that by Kouamé et al. (2021), have shown that very few children use the available latrines due to their dilapidated state, poor hygiene and certain defects. Nevertheless, the rate of open defecation can be reduced, as is the case in some African countries (Aschale et al. 2021), or the phenomenon can be curbed, on the one hand, by raising awareness among pupils and parents and, on the other, by providing all schools with latrines to protect young children from disease, as mentioned by Bah et al. (2022) in public primary schools in Nzérékoré, Guinea.

During the site visits, an inventory was made of 40 latrines in 31 of the 36 school groups and three latrines in three of the 10 single schools. These latrines were all pit latrines, consisting of dry latrines (76.3%) and flush latrines (23.7%) (Table 4). The latter, i.e. flush latrines, which were very common in the town of Man, can be explained by the fact that this town, which is the capital of the department, is the most urbanized of the localities in the department. As for dry pit latrines, their high use in schools is linked to the lack of tap water in most of them, especially as their use does not require the use of water (Tilley et al. 2014). In addition, according to the headmasters of schools that did not have flush latrines, paying the meter bill for tap water was one of the limiting factors that led to the construction of dry pit latrines. It, therefore, seems imperative for the government to provide a subsidy to public primary schools to support the maintenance of WASH infrastructure, as the continuous presence of water in schools would contribute to the physical hygiene of very young children (Dodos et al. 2019; Grossi et al. 2019). Egbinola & Amanambu (2015) also noted the use of pit toilets, the majority of which were ordinary pit latrines with very few ventilated improved pit (VIP) latrines, even in secondary schools due to the limited financial resources required for the former type of latrine compared with flush latrines (Tilley et al. 2014).

As shown in Table 4, the vast majority of latrines (76.7%) consisted of at least four blocks and in 76.3% of cases were separated by gender into boys' and girls' latrines. This situation is an advantage in sub-prefectural schools in terms of preserving the privacy of young girls, as it can facilitate the effectiveness of education and the progress of girls. A number of studies have shown that the lack of adequate sanitation infrastructure to guarantee privacy for natural needs such as defecation is likely to lead to higher repetition and dropout rates among girls than boys, especially after puberty (Ray & Datta 2017; Kim & Rhee 2019). However, given the significant rate of 26.8% of gender-neutral latrines installed in schools, local school management committees and the government still need to make additional efforts, especially since the majority of latrines, about 80%, were installed in the last decade, 2010–2020. Indeed, the high latrine completion rate achieved in public primary schools in recent decades (i.e. 33.3% between 2010 and 2015 and 45% between 2015 and 2020) is a sign of the political will of the Côte d'Ivoire government to ensure an environment conducive to girls' enrolment and retention in school (MENET 2017; UNICEF_CI 2020). The high rate of 74.2% of latrine construction achieved by international organizations (Table 4) also supports this view.

Field visits to the 36 school groups and 10 single schools revealed that the school grounds and classrooms are swept every school day, i.e. from Monday to Friday. With regard to the packaging of the waste produced (Table 5), the majority of schools (93.5%) have waste bins made up of containers such as old buckets, sacks, cardboard boxes, conventional waste bins and cut cans, which shows that the image of the living environment is taken into account in schools. The diversity of waste containers from one school to another is linked to the resources available to various schools, given the current lack of funding for environmental hygiene in primary schools (McGinnis et al. 2017; Duah 2024), which justifies the dominance of old buckets in 69.6% of schools. Therefore, the government's litter policy, which aims to promote a conducive environment for learning, should consider the management of waste generated in schools by providing schools with good temporary conditioning facilities, such as conventional waste bins, before their final disposal. This is because containers such as cardboard cannot withstand rain. Similarly, the handling of containers other than traditional bins is not easy, especially for very young children, when the bins are transported to the final disposal site. All this contributes to the shine of the school through good hygiene of the school environment (Thakadu et al. 2018).

In addition, waste containers were placed either in classrooms, in school yards or in front of each classroom in all the schools surveyed (Table 5). The waste collected was disposed of in the countryside, on the outskirts of schools or in pits dug near schools, without any of it being recycled, as shown by Mulanwa (2016) in urban primary schools in Ndola, Zambia. However, good supervision, as in the work of Hens et al. (2010) and Adeboye et al. (2023), has improved the knowledge, attitudes and practices of primary school children in solid waste management in northern South Africa and Ibadan, Nigeria, respectively. Under the guidance of Adeboye et al. (2023), the pupils were able to sort waste and make various objects from the waste components generated, which were found to be mainly paper, nylon and a small fraction of organic waste. This type of waste management in schools would teach good environmental hygiene practices to all the children who pass through these schools and would prevent waste from being incinerated, as is the case in most of the schools visited (65.2%). In fact, waste management in schools plays a crucial role in promoting sustainable development, as education serves as a precursor to raising awareness and instilling habits in society (Haniva et al. 2024). Regarding the location of waste bins in schools, given the situation in the Man Department, bins should be located in the school grounds and classrooms. This would allow students to dispose of waste generated during breaks in the bins located on the school grounds. Paper and other types of waste generated during lessons must be disposed of in the classroom bins. In addition, the differentiation of the bins according to the category of waste (i.e. plastic, paper, food waste, etc.) would facilitate the sorting of waste during the collection process, as prescribed in the Waste Management Training Manual for Primary Schools prepared by Duclos (2021).

The assessment of WASH services in public primary schools in the Department of Man made it possible to evaluate the existing situation in terms of latrines, water points and environmental hygiene. In the capitals of the sub-prefectures of the department, there are 158 public schools, including 124 primary schools and 34 pre-primary schools, divided into 36 school groups and 10 single schools, with a total of 31,824 pupils, 48.15% of whom are girls, taught by 841 teachers, 41.3% of whom are women. Most of the school groups (77.8%–86.1%) have handwashing facilities, water points and latrines. However, very few single schools (30%) had latrines, while the majority had handwashing facilities and water points. Water points consisted of wells, tap water and borehole water, with wells being more common in schools. The types of latrines used in schools were dry pit latrines and flush latrines, with a predominance of dry pit latrines, most of which consisted of at least four blocks and were gender-segregated for boys and girls. Most of the latrines were constructed between 2010 and 2020 by the government, local school management committees and international organizations. However, the majority of latrines were donated by international organizations, including Caritas Mission, ADB, IsDB, UNICEF, Care, RESCUE and Save the Children, of which UNICEF was the largest contributor to latrine construction. However, around one-third of the latrines built are out of use due to pressure from local people, lack of maintenance, damaged structures and full pits. In addition, not all schools have waste bins. The most common waste bins are old buckets, most of which are placed in classrooms, and the contents are usually incinerated in the open air. In short, government and donor efforts to improve the quality of schools have been slow to bear fruit due to a lack of maintenance and ownership of the infrastructure provided. However, given the multiplicity of actors, interventions and funding, additional government efforts are needed to provide public primary schools with waste management equipment and resources to maintain the infrastructure built, and in particular to implement national standards for WASH in schools.

The authors thank the authorities of the Man Regional Department of Education and all the teachers for their availability during the data collection. They are also grateful to the members of the Biotechnology and Environmental Engineering Research Unit of the two universities, NANGUI ABROGOUA University and the University of Man, for their critical comments and suggestions.

This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sectors.

F.M.Z., N.A.A.K.K. and J.-M.P.O. conceptualized the study, collected the data, wrote, reviewed and edited the article. A.J.C.B., L.S.C., D.S., M.K. and L.C. wrote, reviewed and edited the article.

All relevant data are included in the paper or its Supplementary Information.

The authors declare there is no conflict.