SQR recently attended a meeting to launch a project to encourage the installation and use of ecological toilets.
The meeting was quite a grand one. It was reported to the UN, and featured on local and national media, including CCTV.
The meeting consisted of four parts: opening ceremony, expert lectures, organisation experience-sharing and action-starting ceremony.
Opening ceremony:
The host welcomed everyone, and the sponsor gave a short speech.
Expert lecture:
Some doctors and scholars majoring in related fields spoke about the importance of the ecological toilet and the necessity of building ecological toilets for people in disaster area.
Organization experience sharing:
Several leaders of some NGOs and volunteers shared their experience of ecological toilet building. A village head talked about when he used the toilet built by an NGO.
Du Yan, the Chinese project manager in Ecologia shared experience that they cooperated with Rabbit King, another NGO, to do such a project.
They have presented information about the ecological toilet to local people, and they have built some public toilets for several villages. They encouraged villagers to build ecological toilets for family use by offering microfinance loan and some favourable conditions. She emphasized that when you begin to implement a project, you must make a demonstration as an example for villagers at first. Because it can be hard to persuade people to change their behaviour and use this new technology, you have to demonstrate tangible and real advantages to attract them. They once chose one family to help build ecological toilet. The child of this family was so excited that she told all her classmates and friends. All the children poured into her house to have a look at the new-style toilet and asked their parents also to build such a toilet when they went back home.
“This at last proved to be a successful propaganda tool,” she concluded.
Action starting ceremony:
Host read the proposal. Representatives from all the organizations and government went to fill the organisation name and project site in a huge map.
