Skip to content Skip to cookie consent
Skip to content

Tools and guides

Choosing and building latrines – Good practice guide

Improve household sanitation effectively with this practical advice

Available in Portuguese, English and French

Reveal logo - Tools to support community transformation

Reveal logo - tools to support community transformation. Photo: Chris Boyd/Tearfund

A member of the local community gathers fresh, clean water in Ethiopia

From: Reveal toolkit: Water, sanitation and hygiene 

Tools and good practice guides supporting access to safe water, sanitation and hygiene practices

Managing and disposing of human waste safely is vital to the health, self-respect and safety of communities. It affects children’s education and people’s ability to earn a livelihood. This tool gives guidance on choosing and constructing an appropriate latrine for a private household. The assumption is that any latrine construction work is part of a wider water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) programme.

This tool will help you think about the location of the latrine, how it will be maintained and operated, the needs of those who use it, available materials and building techniques, and important physical and environmental considerations.

Other languages

Share this resource

If you found this resource useful, please share it with others so they can benefit too.

Get our email updates

Be the first to hear about our latest learning and resources

Sign up now - Get our email updates

Cookie preferences

Your privacy and peace of mind are important to us. We are committed to keeping your data safe. We only collect data from people for specific purposes and once that purpose has finished, we won’t hold on to the data.

For further information, including a full list of individual cookies, please see our privacy policy.

  • These cookies are necessary for the website to function and cannot be switched off in our systems.

  • These cookies allow us to measure and improve the performance of our site. All information these cookies collect is anonymous.

  • These allow for a more personalised experience. For example, they can remember the region you are in, as well as your accessibility settings.

  • These cookies help us to make our adverts personalised to you and allow us to measure the effectiveness of our campaigns.