Evaluation of Business Models for Fecal Sludge Emptying and Transport in Informal Settlements of Kampala, Uganda
, Swaib Semiyaga 4 and Damir Brdjanovic 1,5Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Manuscript No.: water-1880434-peer-review-v1
Full Title: Evaluation of business models for fecal sludge emptying and transport in informal settlements of Kampala, Uganda
Reviewer Comments: This manuscript highlighted different business models for fecal sludge emptying and transport, developed an evaluation framework, and tested in informal settlements of Kampala through key informant interviews and stakeholder consultation. The authors have done an excellent job documenting features of different FSM business models around the globe.
The manuscript presents interesting findings, and there is a potential for using this framework to evaluate fecal sludge management (FSM) scenarios in other parts of the world to ensure decreased household expenses and make FSM profitable to the private sector service providers. In the following sections, I am providing my comments on the manuscript:
Major Comments:
(1) The authors should include a general equation (preferably with one example) showing how the service criteria scoring and weighting were done. For example, the author should show how the weightage of Financial service criteria was calculated as 27%.
(2) Similarly, a generalized equation should be presented for the Business model criteria score calculation and overall score for each business model (with one example). These will ensure an easier understanding of the calculation steps and application of the framework by others.
(3) The author should include a supplementary document that provides all the scoring calculations for different business models for both cesspool and gulper technologies.
(4) The author should discuss how local conditions can influence the scores. For example, one business model can have a different score in different parts of the world based on social perceptions, institutional capacities, etc.
(5) The author should highlight the limitation of the study: Data collection through focus group discussions (FGDs), in-depth interviews (IDIs), key informant interviews (KIIs), and observations are subjected to socio-economic, personal, and even political bias. These limitations should be mentioned as inherent to such a data collection approach.
Overall, the manuscript provides a good framework for evaluating fecal sludge business model. Therefore, I recommend the manuscript as accepted, provided the authors address my comments above.
Author Response
Please see the attachment
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
Singh et al. developed an evaluation framework for assessing business models of fecal sludge emptying and transport. This study focused on informal settlements and leveraged key informant interviews and stakeholder consultations to collect data. The framework developed in this study may be adopted by other researchers to evaluate emptying technologies. This comprehensive study provides applied research in the field of fecal sludge management.
- Definitions and descriptions of both cesspool and gulper should be included. It is unclear if the cesspool is a holding tank or an emptying tool.
- The tables are quite large in the manuscript. Are all the tables necessary in the main text? Could more abbreviated versions be included in the manuscript with full tables in the SI?
- The colors are described to represent inputs (L 131-135) and outputs (L 150-155). How can the colors represent both input values and output values?
- It is also unclear why the traffic light reporting system was used with only three categorical values used for representing low, moderate, and high potential. These represent since outputs are continuous. More discussion on the potential advantages and disadvantages of using these systems should be included.
- Authors should consider including information on how many stakeholders were involved in this study along with a summary of their backgrounds.
- Line 174: Why is full emptying specified here over just emptying? Would clients be more accepting of partial emptying?
- Sections 3.1.1 and 3.1.2: Authors may consider including what definitions were used for classifying demand and supply challenges.
- It is unclear how different business models can to different results for environmental and public health.
- An explanation of the weightage used for the various service criteria should be discussed.
- Figures 2 and 3: The resolutions of the figures should be improved, percentages within the circles are difficult to read, and the red line should be removed from under “center” in the business center
- Section 3.5: An interesting discussion is provided for the results.
- This study evaluates fairly common and more simple sanitation technologies. Can the authors discuss how the framework could be used to analyze more novel technologies?
Author Response
Please see the attachment
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
