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Programmes > Meeting the Need > Sustainable Building Technologies for Education

Sustainable Building Technologies for Education - Ethical Dilemmas

The Need

Building with low environmental impact in areas of great need and low income. Bricks are traditionally fired using charcoal a scarce local resource in Malawi which has led to increased loss of trees and subsequent soil erosion. For a country where majority of people survive on precarious subsistence farming any further loss of land or forest is very worrying.

Action

When the Community Schools programme was launched by the Government of Malawi in 1994 it was seen as a vital opportunity to explore and develop local skills in school construction which did not depend on the tradition burnt brick approach.

Several trial classrooms were built by the ministry with the assistance of DFID, using a range technologies such as wood frame and concrete block until it was decided to use the stabilised soil block (SSB) approach for future school and teacher centre construction.

Brick production in Malawi

These techniques developed in Kenya allow local builders to sieve soil on site, mix it with 15 percent cement before compressing it in a specially developed ram compressing the blocks.

The Result

The schools built using this process have been a dramatic success and the new teachers development centres are also using the approach to build 130 new centres.

There are no simple solutions in this area however. One problem has been that for the very poor even the small amount of cash required to purchase cement makes the SSB unaffordable. On the other hand they are able to gather clay and wood and if the environmental cost is hidden they can contribute to the building of a school with no cost to them apart from their own time. This is a dilemma. From an economics point of view in poor rural communities cash has an intrinsic value higher than itself. Quality control is also essential as there could be a temptation to make the cement go further by weakening the mix when making the blocks.

A solution may be to focus the development of SSB construction in the towns and cities where bricks would also have to be bought.

Taking it Further

The challenge now is to help work with local communities and construction projects investigate the potential of SSB as a viable alternative to burnt brick.

Follow Up

Mr Nyasulu, Director of Forestry in the Malawi Government was quick to applaud the work done by DFID in the development of SSB construction projects.

"We welcome the work of DFID in this area" he said "it is clear to us that SSBs are a tree saving measure."

Mr Nyasulu, Director of Forestry