South Africa

“Sometimes toilets and taps are not working for months and even years. If we don’t fix them, no one will.”

Lerato Monama – Member, WASSUP Diepsloot

#CommPlumbing

Since 2016 IWSH has supported community plumbing collective WASSUP Diepsloot – the Water, Amenities and Sanitation Services Upgrade Program – to upgrade and maintain communal toilets and taps in densely-populated township settings in Gauteng Province... which despite only accounting for 1.5% of the country’s land area, is home to more than a quarter of its population. WASSUP Diepsloot has been responsible for enormous savings in water plus improvements to public health and safety impacting thousands of residents of Diepsloot Extension 1, for over a decade.

Adopt A Toilet

WASSUP runs an ongoing program of repairs, upgrades and maintenance for communal toilets and taps in Extension 1, Diepsloot. Their “Adopt a Toilet” campaign assigns every USD $100 donation received towards the maintenance and repair of one communal toilet for one year, with every new toilet added to their program ensuring a working facility for approximately 39 households and saving almost 370,000 gallons of water.

Tackle A Tap

Supported by the World Plumbing Council, IWSH and WASSUP launched a program through June-July 2020 called “Tackle a Tap” that brought together local and international plumbing industry partners to repair 2,000 communal taps across Diepsloot in 50 days. WASSUP welcomed volunteer plumbers from the Institute of Plumbing, South Africa (IOPSA) and technical support and resources from leading South African plumbing merchant Plumblink.

Women In Plumbing

A new IWSH-WASSUP initiative for 2021 connects with IOPSA's Women In Plumbing program. In Sept 2021 the groups collaborated with Metro Evangelical Services (MES) and BluLever Education to install nine toilets, eight basins, eight showers, 12 sinks, two gulleys and an inspection eye at a MES-run building in New Doorfontein, Johannesburg. The project included new plumbing apprentices from Blulever, products from Plumblink, and additional support from IOPSA and The Wot-If? Trust. MES is a registered NGO that has been working toward providing sustainable solutions to pervasive poverty in the inner cities of Johannesburg, Cape Town, Port Elizabeth and Kempton Park for 35 years.

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