Next friday, we’ll be participating at the London Sanitation Hackathon, hosted by the Hub Westminster.  The Sanitation Hackathon brings together technologists and creative minds with sanitation experts to develop innovative solutions to some of the greatest sanitation challenges facing the developing world.

The event, which is being organised by the World Bank alongside local and global partners, will take place simultaneously in several cities across the world around the time of the World Toilet Summit (3rd December 2012). London will play host to the UK event which is being organised by Water and Sanitation for the Urban Poor (WSUP) and sponsored by Unilever’s Domestos brand. Sanitation is one of the biggest global challenges with 2.5 billion people lacking access to improved sanitation and over 1 billion people practicing open defecation. With the number of mobile subscriptions exceeding 5 billion, more people today have access to a mobile phone than a toilet. The Sanitation Hackathon emerges out of the recognition that the rapid increase of penetration, awareness and literacy in information and communication technologies (ICTs) in the developing world can transform water and sanitation management.

The Sanitation Hackathon follows on the success of the first ever Water Hackathon in October 2011, initiated by the World Bank. The event featured nearly 1,000 registered hackers at ten locations worldwide who developed some 62 new prototypes. The objective of the sanitation hackathon is to develop innovative software solutions that address real-world problems in sanitation, which are being discussed ahead of time by sanitation professionals, and posted here: http://www.sanitationhackathon.org/