Carrying on the head is common in many parts of the developing world, as only a simple length of cloth shaped into a ring or ball is needed to carry loads approaching the person's own weight. The practice is efficient, in a place or at a time when there are no vehicles or beasts of burden available for transporting the objects. Today, women and men may be seen carrying burdens on top of their heads where there is no less expensive, or more efficient, way of transporting workloads. In India, women carry baskets of bricks to workmen on construction sites. It is also used by the lowest caste to carry away human waste that they scoop out of pit latrines, the practice of manual scavenging.
