Bamboo supplies millions of households across the world with employment and building materials. It is often used as a fast-growing alternative to timber or other resources, and its products can have a low or even negative carbon footprint across their lifecycle. Bamboo reduces pressure on forest resources and can replace cement and plastic in drainage pipes, housing and storage facilities. It also creates resilient structures which can withstand earthquakes. As such, this plant has the potential to play a major role in the UN’s Sustainable Development Goal 11: creating affordable, sustainable and resilient infrastructure and housing.
Since the 1980s, new technologies have led to the emergence of prefabricated bamboo housing made with engineered bamboo. Engineered construction products allow bamboo to be easily transformed into standardised dimensions, enabling its easy use in modern structures. Bamboo panels and flooring often outperform their wooden counterparts by some technological measures of strength and rigidity.
With its partners in many countries, INBAR is at the forefront of international efforts to promote greater use of sustainable bamboo buildings and other constructions: