A research group in sustainable agrosystems from ETH Zürich is developing a circular economy system for regions in Rwanda, South Africa, DRC, and Ethiopia, tackling the challenges of food security and sanitation as a synergy. They collaborate with local teams in each region based on establishing vibrant and inclusive transdisciplinary innovation platforms.

Unprecedented rural to urban migration is placing enormous burdens on city areas across Africa. As a consequence, informal settlements are growing rapidly. The lack of appropriate sanitation, combined with high population densities, creates an environment suited to the outbreak of various waterborne diseases. Furthermore, rates of food insecurity in these settlements are amongst the worst on the continent. Together these development challenges account for the urban poor being amongst the most vulnerable populations in the world. Thus, efforts to improve livelihoods across the rural-urban nexus are critical to socially equitable and ecologically sustainable development in Africa.

Establishing these transdisciplinary platforms as an initial phase entails identifying and including key stakeholders, identifying and testing selected innovations, and acquiring a comprehensive baseline understanding of the biophysical and socio-economic circumstances for each city region. The targets of the project are:

- Installation of ecologically sound, socially acceptable, and hygienically safe innovative sanitation solutions can improve public health, reduce environmental pollution and provide high-quality agricultural inputs.

- Increased access and use of locally sourced soil amendments to improve sustainable local agriculture.

- Improved processes to increase value addition and hence farmers’ incomes.

- Involvement of private actors across all sections of selected food value chains, emphasizing empowerment, participation, and influence of women and youth.

- Developing locally suitable solutions- private enterprise, public investment, public/private partnerships, and civic science- will enable sustainable sanitation and waste-recycling innovations.

Improved control of nutrient flows and recycling of nutrients across the rural-urban nexus.

- Generation of improved economic opportunities, embedded in circular economy principles, sensitive to inequitable gender and age dynamics.

- Facilitate an enabling policy environment for scaling selected innovations in partnership with policymakers and practitioners.

- The diffusion of best practices and knowledge of identified innovations beyond the RUNRES focus regions.

In DRC: The consortia consist of waste collectors, waste processors, and coffee cooperatives as end-users of the produced products. Linking waste processors to waste collectors and end-users is one success of RUNRES DRC.

The stakeholders describe that working jointly on the implementation of innovations is very helpful. Everybody can concentrate on what they can do best, while in collaboration they can reach something which they couldn’t do on their own.

In Ethiopia: With the support of RUNRES, Anjo-Nus could purchase processing equipment and managed to fulfill the “food items processing criteria” set by the authorities. They also managed to cover the laboratory cost requested to get product standardization and the product marketing certificate.

Back in business, Anjo-Nus created employment opportunities. Currently, the enterprise employs two female and three male workers and up to then temporary workers depending on the market demand.

In June 2021 Anjo-Nus won the SUN Ethiopia Pitch Competition, which aims to identify and support innovative SMEs who are working on affordable and nutritious food. Anjo-Nus won 5’000 USD for the expansion of their business.

In Rwanda: In Rwanda, some RUNRES stakeholders were already experimenting with the valorization of organic waste but only on a very small scale.

By connecting the stakeholders of the waste and the agricultural sector and by providing technical and financial resources, three innovations were able to develop and scale up their waste transformation activities.

In South Africa: RUNRES South Africa has managed to process 3336 tons of green waste and 884 tons of sewage sludge through the co-composting innovation led by Duzi-Turf. More than 7000 tons of green waste and 1500 tons of sludge have been diverted from the landfills since the beginning of the project.

The RUNRES project through the co-composting innovation has also allowed for the employment of approximately 13 workers, thereby improving the livelihoods of local people. Most importantly the co-composting process has managed to reduce pathogen loads in compost to levels recommended by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and South African regulations for safe agricultural use.