GLOBAL BAMBOO HOUSING PROGRAMME

Vision

We believe that bamboo housing can make a significant contribution to improving the quality of life of many hundreds of millions of poor and disadvantaged people.

Mission

The mission of the global bamboo housing programme is to promote the subsitution of unsustainable building materials with environmental friendly bamboo for construction - where appropriate - to provide solutions to the shortage of proper housing for the poor, and to develop housing related livelihood options.

Objectives of the programme

• To raise awareness among the policy to grass root level people on the use of bamboo as a durable, sustainable and affordable building material for permanent housing, public structures  and temporary shelters
• To develop, improve and document the bamboo housing technology through research, development activities.
• To transfer technology through workshop, publications, demonstration projects and capacity building activities; and
• To develop or enhance the market for bamboo housing, targeting wider economic group.

Some facts

• The world's population reached 6 billion in 1999 and at the current rate of increase will top 7 billion soon after 2010.
• At least 600 million urban dwellers in Africa, Asia and Latin America live in "life and health-threatening homes".  At least one billion people do not have access to safe and healthy shelter and the number will increase dramatically with population growth if the appropriate action is not taken (UNEP, nd).
• One billion people live in bamboo houses. In Bangladesh, 73% of the population live in bamboo houses. Bamboo provides pillars, walls, window frames, rafters, room separators, ceilings and roofs.
• It has been calculated in Costa Rica that only 70 ha of bamboo plantation are sufficient to build 1000 bamboo houses per year. If these houses were built with timber, 600 ha of natural forest would be destroyed each year.
• Studies show that processing of bamboo requires only 1/8th the energy for processing of concrete and 1/3rd of that of wood to create a building material of the same capacity. In comparison to steel, bamboo needs only 1/50 of the energy for processing (Roach 1996).
• Due to the lightweight and favorable elastic properties of bamboo, buildings made from it are very good at resisting earthquakes. All 30 houses in the epicenter of a 7.6 magnitude earthquake survived without any damage in Costa Rica.
• Bamboo possesses excellent strength properties, especially tensile strength. Studies shows that bamboo is as strong as wood and some species even exceed the strength of Shorea robusta and Tectona grandis (Sattar, 1995).

Bamboo housing as a sustainable solution

Bamboo has a very long history of use for various purposes such as food, shelter, furniture and so on. Bamboo has been serving humanity from cradle to grave in many countries for aeons in many different and ingenious ways.

Bamboo is one of the oldest materials used for the construction of houses and other structures. As a building material it is relatively cheap, easy to work with and readily available in most of the countries where bamboo grows.

The importance of bamboo as a construction material, particularly for housing, has received a greater attention in recent years. In Asia, traditional bamboo houses of low-income groups use bamboo as structural elements to support the structure. Even when other materials are used, bamboo forms a major part of the unit. Low cost bamboo houses are a cheap and safe alternative to the shelters of plastic, wood and stone that are currently being used by many homeless people. These houses are made from prefabricated and natural bamboo generally associated with other kinds of building materials like wood, mud, brick and concrete  so as to make house in different appearances and to increase durability.

The global shortage of housing materials is such that it warrants serious consideration, particularly in developign countries. To keep pace with population growth and to replace old houses, about 75 million units need to be constructed each year in Asia alone (Sattar, 1995). The short supply of timber and other conventional construction materials accompanied by rising costs make it imperative to increasingly use bamboo for housing. The demand of low cost houses in Philippines from 1993 to 1998 was about 3.8 million units (Rebong, 1995).

Why bamboo housing?

Affordability: Of all the advantages of bamboo housing technology, the most important is its low cost  that doesn't sacrifice quality, durability or space. Instead it provides an option that is feasible for populations with scarce resources. According to PNB Costa Rica, bamboo houses are about 20% cheaper than the usual type of social housing. The cost of one house built by Viviendas del Hogar de Cristo (VHC) in Equador is less than US$450 which is affordable for poor and marginal people. Government subsidies could further reduce the total cost for poor.

Employment generation: The manufacturing and distribution of low cost bamboo houses itself will provide employment to a range of people and there will be extra employment generation in its forward and backward linkages such as cultivation, harvesting, primary processing, transport and marketing of bamboo.

Availability of raw materials: Raw materials are easily and readily available in the bamboo growing countries. It has been calculated in the Costa Rican context that only 70 ha of bamboo plantation are sufficient to build 1000 bamboo houses per year. If these houses were built with timber, 600 ha of natural forest would be destroyed each year.

Adaptability: As the bamboo has been in use since long period of time in our society in one or other ways, this will not be very new for us. Bamboo housing is a self-help approach, which develops ownership and intimacy with house to the people.

Flexibility: Bamboo allows greater flexibility in designing and construction. One of the important advantages of bamboo housing is that it can be maintained regularly by replacing deteriorated parts. Application of traditional and modern technology in architectural design is another benefit of bamboo.

Technology: It requires minimum technology. Most of the bamboo houses are based on exiting local technology, which doesn't require high-tech to construct. Its versatility offers multiple technological options for very economic to highly expensive buildings. It is also easily integrated with advanced technology

Quick to construct: Bamboo house takes very short time for assembling. Such efficiency makes it very important for disaster management and quick relief to victims or affected population to rehabilitate their family life. According to Viviendas del Hogar de Cristo (VHC), Equador, one bamboo house can be assembled in 4-5 hours.

Durability: With proper treatment bamboo provides service life of up to 30 years. Durability can be increased with careful choice of bamboo species, preservation, use of complementary construction materials and replacement of outdated or deteriorated parts in a regular basis. Corrugated and pre-fabricated bamboo are also widely used to increase durability and to increase resistance from damaging factors.

Safety: Due to lightweight and favorable elastic property of bamboo, its quality to resist earthquake pressure is very good. Gutierez (1998) reports that 30 houses that were in the epicenter of 7.6 magnitude rector scale earthquake survived without any damage in Costa Rica. Many of the concrete homes and hotels around them had collapsed but all 30 bamboo-houses remained intact.

Comfort: People prefer bamboo houses in the rural tropical areas where temperature is high in summer. In China, people still construct bamboo cottage to avoid heat and to enjoy cool air especially in the south of Yunnan Province. (Shensue and Qisheng, 1998)

Environmental benefits: This is a major consideration given in the recent years. Construction program should emphasize use of local materials, energy efficient designs and materials that don't harm health and the environment and labor intensive technologies that employ more people (UNEP, nd). Only bamboo can meet most of these criteria. Bamboo requires a little energy for the production of normal use of several building materials. Bamboo requires only 30 MJ/m3 per N/mm2 compared to concrete, steel and timber that require 240, 500 and 80 MJ/m3 per n/mm2 (TUE, website). Studies show that processing of bamboo requires only 1/8 of the energy that concrete needs to create a building material of the same capacity. In comparison to steel bamboo needs only 1/50 the amount of energy for processing (Roach 1996).

Control of deforestation: The rural housing in tropical developing counties still depend to a great extent on the availability of product products i.e. wood, thatch grasses etc. The depletion of forest resources and checks imposed on their harvesting have led to severe shortage of wood raw material and in some countries wood has gone beyond the reach of poor for building construction. In such case bamboo could be a viable option or alternative to replace wood. During disasters in developing countries, the general tendency is that affected people build temporary shelters nearby forest by cutting trees, which is environmentally and economically not a viable alternative. Bamboo could make viable substitute to control indiscriminate cutting of trees and to protect environment.

Sustainability: Social, economical and environmental sustainability is a growing issue of current developmental field. Bamboo has such a quality to meet all the sustainability criteria. It can be regenerated within 2-3 years, while that with timber could take longer than 25 years. It is the fastest growing plant of the world and replacement doesn't take longer time. Most of the locally available materials and tools can be sufficient enough to build simple low cost bamboo house.