The World Bank has announced it will subsidize a project to develop toilets through the PPP model in Kumasi (Ghana).

Kumasi is Ghana's second largest city with a population of 2 million and 5.4% population growth rate. It is estimated that 58% of households do not have access to personal toilets. These households either share facilities with other households, use one of the city's 321 public toilet facilities, or resort to open defecation.

Public toilets have historically been financed through municipal budgets. As part of the private sector strategy, the government is looking to attract the private sector and other non-state actors to finance and operate viable public services, including toilets. In Kumasi, the Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly (KMA) would like to involve the private sector in the rehabilitation, construction, maintenance and operation of public toilets under a Build, Own, Operate, Transfer (BOOT) arrangement.

The project development objective is to increase access to clean, convenient and safe public toilets for the population of Kumasi.

A total of 108 public toilet facilities will be built though a PPP arrangement and over 20,000 customers will use clean, convenient and safe public toilet facilities on a daily basis.

The World Bank said a recent report that it will fund two components:

• OBA subsidy to support construction and rehabilitation of public toilets by private operators (US$ 3 million). This component will subsidize the cost of converting 70 public toilet facilities to water closet technology (by means of demolishing the old facilities and building the new ones) and rehabilitation of existing 38 public toilet facilities that use water closet system but require renovation to meet the service standards.
• Independent Verification (US$ 200,000). This component will support the establishment of baseline and targets for private operators applying for OBA grants. The IVA will assist in the setting of output targets; conduct output verification according to the technical standards specified by KMA, including verifying billing and revenue collection at facilities under operation; prepare output verification reports recommending subsidy payments to operators meeting targets; and analyze socio-economic indicators before and after subproject investments. Under this component, KMA will procure the IVA to verify that the outputs under the project meet the technical standards. 

The World Bank Groups FY13-16 Country Partnership Strategy (CPS) for Ghana makes specific reference to the country's lack of progress in meeting the Millennium Development Goal for improved sanitation methods.