News and announcements

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The Peepoople founder Professor Anders Wilhelmson has been nominated to the award Social Capitalists of the Year by one of Sweden´s leading business magazines, Veckans Affärer. Anders Wilhelmson is nominated in the Entrepreneur category.

Links:
www.va.se




Camilla was invited this morning to the Kenya National morning news KTN Sunrise Live to talk about her work in the informal settlements of Kibera where she is implementing the Peepoo solution in collaboration with the local women.




The Peepoo has received the prestigious Swedish Award Design S. The design community is thus focusing more and more of their attention towards innovative solutions that both are aesthetically appealing and create business opportunities with a focus on socially and environmentally sustainable development. Read more in the Swedish press release:

Links:
www.mynewsdesk.com




Peepoo is presented as one of 70 ”brilliant Swedish inventions” in an exhibition organised by KTH Innovation, during the two week festival, Love Stockholm.




In Leksand, in Dalarna in Sweden, about 2000 entrepreneurs and decision makers from all over the world gather at the 5th Global YES Summit - Rework the World that is arranged in co-operation with Tallberg Foundation, YES Inc and LSU networks. The Peepoo project will be presented. For more information follow peepoople twitter.




The Peepoo is featured in Taschen’s new book about sustainable product design.




Together with Oxfam, Peepoople are conducting a field test in Port-au-Prince.

The poor sanitation in Haiti´s camps adds disease risk and the "authorities are struggling to adress the worsening problem of human waste"*. In some areas in Porte-Au-Prince one toilet is shared by as many as 400-900 persons (many lack availability). But where there are latrines there are other problems, "you can have 100 000 latrines, but you need a way to remove the excrement".




Camilla Wirseen, one of Peepoople's founders and project director was appointed "Woman of the year" by the Swedish women's magazine,Tara, in November, 2009 for her efforts to spread information about the Peepoo project to important stakeholders all over the world.




In November 2009, Anders Wilhelmson, the founder of Peepoople AB and the inventor of the Peepoo concept became an Ashoka fellow.

Links:
www.ashoka.org




The 1st IWA Development Congress is titled ”Water and Sanitation services – what works in developing countries” and will be held in Mexico City from 15-19 November, 2009. It will have a strong focus on what works in a developing setting and those projects that have potential for large-scale delivery. Peepoople is invited to participate and give a presentation.

Links:
www.iwa2009mexico.org




Peepoople has just completed the first round of external funding with business angels and STING Capital. The company is now preparing further funding rounds to start serial production of Peepoo toilets.

Links:
Sting Capital: www.stingcapital.com




To take the company to the next phase in its development, Peepoople has recruited Karin Ruiz as its new CEO.

Karin has worked in senior management positions for the past 15 years and has a solid international business background. Industrial experience includes healthcare, food packaging, ICT and venture capital. Until recently, she was with Capio, where she held positions as Marketing Director for Capio Proximity Care and Director Business Development for Capio Healthcare Nordic. She has successfully managed and started up various business areas, departments and strategic development projects in Capio, Invest in Sweden Agency (ISA), Adera and Tetra Pak. She is internationally experienced, having travelled extensively throughout the world and lived and worked in Asia for several years. She has a genuine interest in development issues, and strongly believes in social entrepreneurship to address social problems and fight poverty. Karin has a Master of Science degree in Industrial Engineering and Management from Chalmers University of Technology.

Links:
Pressrelease: www.mynewsdesk.com/se/pressroom/peepoople




Peepoople has appointed Mr. Suraj Sudhakar as the project manager in Nairobi for the Peepoo Initial Launch Project. Before joining Peepoople, Suraj was an Acumen Fund Fellow and worked with Ecotact in Nairobi building and running public toilets. Previous experience includes setting up and running social enterprises in India, such as Dial Ambulance in Mumbai and Rural Innovations Network in Chennai. He started his career in technology, holding a Bachelors of Technology in Computer Science & Technology. Contact: ss@peepoople.com.




With strong support from the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Micro Water Facility and Peepoople have, together, prepared a business plan for how to launch the Peepoo toilet and reach 20,000 users in Nairobi by the third quarter of 2010. The Peepoo Initial Launch Project (ILP) in Nairobi is divided into four phases – (1) project planning and budgeting, (2) preparations of the ILP, (3) execution and evaluation and (4) full-scale launch and scale-up. The Dutch NGOs Simavi and Aqua4All are financially supporting the second phase during the fall of 2009.




On October 3rd a kick-off meeting for the Peepoo Initial Launch Project (ILP) in Nairobi was held in Grace Revival Church in the Kibera slum. More than 50 persons were present from among others; UNICEF, World Bank, Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, SEC Soweto East, Silanga Youth Group, and many Kibera residents participated. The Peepoo ILP in Nairobi will be Peepoople’s first large scale market pilot with 20,000 users. Preparations for the launch have already started. The actual introduction of Peepoos into the market will be in the third quarter of 2010 and the project will run until 2012. The objective of the ILP is to demonstrate and prove the Peepoo solution on a large scale, experiment in the value chain of distribution, usage, collection and reuse, and to test alternative business models. The aim is also to measure and evaluate a number of aspects such as health impact, user attitudes, environmental aspects, willingness-to-pay, fertilizer value, etc. For more information, contact Camilla Wirseen, cw@peepoople.com or Suraj Sudhakar, ss@peepoople.com.




In May, 2009, the Peepoo was successfully tested by 100 participants over the course of 10 days in Mymensingh in Bangladesh, north of Dhaka. The fieldtest was organized and financed by German GTZ. Key findings from the study include high acceptance and usage rate by participants and the perception of important benefits by users, including cleanliness and the ability to go to the toilet more often. Socio-cultural factors proved to be less of an obstacle than anticipated and the participants used and stored the bags in their homes. The use of Peepoos proved to have a positive impact on the participant’s self-perception and 80% said they would like to use the Peepoo every day. To receive a copy of the report please e-mail info@peepoople.com.




The 3rd International Dry Toilet Conference was held 12-15 August 2009 in Finland at Tampere University of Technology. Peepoople’s Camilla Wirseen was invited, together with Elisabeth von Muench, from GTZ Ecosan program, to present the Peepoo project – “Urban slum dwellers in Kenya and Bangladesh benefit from using Peepoos which are self-sanitizing and biodegradable.”




After a presentation of the Peepoo project at the Ministry of Public Health and Sanitation in Kenya in August, 2009, Mr Kariukij, the Chief of Sanitation and his collegues, expressed their ”strong support for the Peepoo project.”




During the Kenyan summer, 300 people in Silanga village in Kibera, Africa’s largest slum, used the Peepoo for one month. They helped us with a large impact assessment done in cooperation with GTZ. We thank the people of the Silanga village for their generous help.

For a full review of the fieldtest, please download the impact assessment from GTZ homepage.
A condensed edition will soon be available from Peepoople.

Links:
http://www.gtz.de




Peepoople was invited for a presentation of The Peepoo Project at the WereldWaterDag in the Netherlands.

WereldWaterDag (Worldwaterday) was organised by UNICEF, Aqua4All and Netherlands Water Partnership (NWP) and held in Rotterdam the 26th of March.




Peepoople was present at the Skoll World Forum on the 25th of March in Oxford.

Links:
http://www.skollfoundation.org




“Peepoo is the ideal system, the ideal product for the biggest problem facing the world”

Prof Eric O. Odada
UNSGAB
Nairobi 09/01/09

Links:
www.unsgab.org




Peepoople are having discussions with Arghyam about conducting a field test in the northern part of Bihar in India early this spring.

Links:
www.arghyam.org




Anders Wilhelmson is presenting the Peepoo project at the Social Entrepreneurship conference held by The Swedish Knowledge Foundation in Stockholm on the 12th of February 2009.

Links:
www.kks.se




The 7th of January was the last day Peepoo toilets were distributed and collected by the Silanga Youth Group in Silanga village in Kibera. Kibera is in one of Africas largest informal settlements with about 1 – 1 ½ million inhabitants. An impact assessment report is currently being made by Jean African Consultants, Nairobi.




Peepoople presented the Peepoo project at World Health Organisation in Geneva on the 22nd of January 2009.




Peepoople and GTZ were invited by BASF for a joint meeting 2 December in Ludwigshafen Germany to discuss the Peepoo project and future cooperation.

GTZ is an international cooperative enterprise for sustainable development with worldwide operations.

Links:
www.gtz.de
www.basf.com




Swedfund, Sweden´s risk capital company specialized in investments in developing countries, is supporting the development of the Peepoople business case.

Links:
www.swedfund.se




The Peepoo project was presented at Designboost November 15-17. Designboost is an annual international design event held in Malmö Sweden. This year the Boost focus was the sustainable city.

“Best product: without doubt the lifesaving and revolutionary, Peepoo, presented by Anders Wilhelmson. A personal toilet in the form of a bag, so simple yet so sophisticated.”

Ewa Kumlin Director Svensk Form

Links:
www.designboost.se
www.svenskform.se




The Peepoo toilet is presented at the IRC Symposium for the Urban Poor: Governance and Partnerships in Delft the Netherlands 19-21 November.

Links:
www.irc.nl




Since august 2008, Dr. Kamal Kar from Calcutta India, the founder of Community Led Total Sanitation has been cooperating as a special advisor to Peepoople.

“There are millions of people living in thousands of slums of big cities of the world who go to bed with an agony and wake up with a greater agony of how to dispose of their ’shit.’ The Peepoo is something which they can use today and start thinking of a gainful and sustainable solution collectively.”

Dr Kamal Kar, Founder CLTS

Links:
www.livelihoods.org/hot_topics/clts.html




Peepoople is conducting a second field test in Kibera Nairobi Kenya November-December 2008.




Peepoople attends the World Toilet Summit & Expo in Macao 4-6 November 2008 that is organised by the World Toilet Organisation.

“Open defecation spreads disease and contaminates water bodies. I am encouraged that innovations like the Peepoo provides safe, hygienic disposal that can be recycled into fertilisers. Congratulations for your spririt of social enterprise.”

Jack Sim, founder World Toilet Organisation

Links:
www.worldtoiletsevents.com




The Peepoo has been selected for a presentation at the Pathway towards Sustainable Sanitation in Africa to be held 24-27 September 2008 in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso.

Links:
www.netsaf.net




The Peepoo is presented at the 2008 World Water Week Stockholm Sweden 17-25 August.

Links:
www.worldwaterweek.org




-Meeting with Prof. Eric O. Odada UNSGAB United Nations Secretary-Generals Advisory Board on Water and sanitation Nairobi 23 June 2008.

Prof. Odada describes the Peepoo as
“A creative technology, highly commendable.”

Links:
www.unsgab.org




Presentation at Sanitation Challenge Conference May 19-21 2008 Wageningen Netherlands.

Links:
www.sanitation-challenge.wur.nl




Field test in Kibera Africa´s largest informal settlement April 07-21 2008.

“The Settlement Executive Committee (SEC), with the consultation office of Kibera Line Saba, Soweto Chief and the residents of Soweto East village, do acknowledge and appreciate your project which you introduced and tested with us.”

Bishop Raphael D. Handa, Chairman SEC Soweto East Nairobi Kenya.