Consumer insights company Pondering Panda says their survey found a third of pupils across South Africa feels there were an insufficient number of toilets at their school. The provinces with the biggest shortages of school toilets were Limpopo and KwaZulu-Natal, where 38% and 37% of the pupils felt there were insufficient toilets at their school. The province offering the best provision of toilets at its schools was Gauteng, where 22% of learners said they did not have enough toilets. Opinion on this question was consistent across age, gender and race groups.
The state of toilets was also a problem. More than 2 in 5 learners (42%) described the condition of toilets at their school as being ‘bad’, and 5% claimed their toilets were unusable. In comparison, 51% of learners described their toilets as being in either a ‘good’ or ‘okay’ condition. There were no significant differences across demographic groups.
The maintenance of toilets at schools is a significant problem, with almost half of the pupils (48%) claiming that the toilets at their school were not kept clean.
South African Youth deserve better and we all know you cannot study on a full bladder!