Reinvent the Toilet Challenge

♤ "Reinvent the Toilet Challenge," is a Water, Sanitation & Hygiene program initiated by Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

♤ Under this program grant is provided to develop a next-generation toilet that can be used to disinfect liquid and solid waste while generating useful end products, both in developing and developed nations.

♤ In October 2013, the Department of Biotechnology (DBT) under the Ministry of Science and Technology of the Government of India and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in collaboration with India’s Biotechnology Industry Research Assistance Council (BIRAC) launched the Reinvent the Toilet Challenge:India. This partnership will support sanitation research and development projects conducted by Indian individuals and organizations to extend affordable sanitation services to poor communities.

In News: A revolutionary waterless toilet powered by the sun, developed to help some of the 2.5 billion people lacking safe and sustainable sanitation around the world, will be unveiled in India this month. Designed and built using a $7,77,000 grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the self-contained, waterless toilet with its innovative technology converts human waste to biochar*, a highly porous charcoal. (TOI March 2014)