with using them. Toto’s innovation saves them the embarrassment. The portable, purse-friendly version is a best-selling consumer product in Japan.
Lean thinking also drives a different sort of innovation.
In a lean economy, toilet-related innovation looks a lot different. In the densest areas of African cities, one time-honored form of waste disposal is the “flying toilet”: bundling refuse into a plastic bag and chucking it as far as possible. It’s understandable: Most people in Africa’s informal settlements lack the basic dignity of modern sanitation. Waste-contaminated water breeds disease, and fear of crime keeps many from using public toilets at night. The “flying toilet” is a stopgap solution — with obvious drawbacks.
The Umande Trust, a community organization in Kenya, came up with a better plan. They helped build a massive cylindrical biodigester that composts the output of a fleet of toilets. Umande charges a few pennies per use, making about $400 per month. Better yet, the system doesn’t drain the water supply like traditional flush toilets, and it creates biogas that powers a community center and heats water for the 400 residents who also shower there every day.
The Sound Princess represents a vanity innovation for the top of the pyramid, where you can also find software that will allow you to find a parking spot or a date, to “farm” fake digital crops, to shake your iPhone to simulate the sound of a whip. They solve problems that arise when the basics are taken care of.
But when the status quo is a flying toilet, anything goes. Lean economies — however challenged they might appear — translate minimal resources into maximum social impact.
As the old adjectives about Africa — “hopeless,” “war torn,” “impoverished”— fade, fat economies must stop assuming that poor countries should mimic them and instead embrace their models for social innovation and efficiency. The post-crash ethos of doing more with less is essential in modern Africa. And for philanthropists like Mr. Gates and world leaders who have committed to solving big problems, lean thinking is imperative.
Dayo Olopade is a journalist and the author of “The Bright Continent: Breaking Rules and Making Change in Modern Africa.”