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Southwest Cameroon Ultra-Low-Cost Housing Program

Quick Overview Groundwork is working on an ultra-low-cost housing program in Southwest Cameroon. We were invited to work on this project and are working in collaboration with United Action for Children (UAC) a local non-profit in Cameroon. Work is starting in Besongabang, a village of about 2500 people. Our goal is to create high quality housing and a healthy, beautiful and fun place to live that is affordable to the average family. Family income ranges from $1.60-$5/day. We can accomplish our goal by using primarily local resources and very little cash. That means using people’s labor and the raw materials that are present locally. The most serious needs of the village are for clean water, good sanitation and improved kitchens that are smoke free with improved cook stoves. Most people use poorly constructed pit latrines or the fields for toilets. Below are typical toilets from worst to best

These pit latrines are dug deep and penetrate into the ground water. As a consequence the ground water is contaminated. Most people get water from wells that are shared by 3-8 families. While the wells are not badly constructed, all the water they get is contaminated by the toilets. Water is carried and stored in open buckets which are then dipped into to get water. Insecure handling of the water adds additional risks of contaminating the water. Numerous diseases are transmitted by unclean water. Globally more than 3.4 million people die each year from water, sanitation, and hygiene-related causes. Nearly all deaths, 99 percent, occur in the developing worldi.

Hauling water out of a typical well with a bucket

Groundwork - Peace Corps volunteer reviewing water tests for coliform bacteria with local resident.

Almost all families cook over 3 stone fires on the ground inside of small sheds without ventilation. According to the World Health Organization over 4 million people die prematurely from illness attributable to the household air pollution from cooking with solid fuels, more than twice as many as from malaria.

Life expectancy is 57 years in Cameroon compared to 84 in Japan (and 79 in the U.S.)ii. Contaminated water, poor sanitation, malaria and smoke filled kitchens are important contributors to this low life expectancy. We know of relatively low cost solutions to each of these problems, some of which are described below. We believe it is possible to implement

Typical kitchen, metal shack outside house with dirt floor and fire inside, and some outside 3 stone fire on dirt floor inside kitchen.

Smoke inside kitchen.

effective initial solutions in a short period of time. We have already been able to help provide safer water. We are not providing a single onetime solution. Rather we are initiating a community process of education, exploration and development. We have initial solutions but these are the start, not the end. While the villagers are poor the region has some wonderful resources. The tribe has lots of land. There is lots of water (120 inches of rain per year). There are forests and excellent conditions for grown materials (round poles, bamboo, reeds, fiber, not to mention food) with rich timber resources. The challenge that we see is to help utilize these resources for the benefit of the local people and in a sustainable way that does not destroy the resource. Too often the forests are destroyed and the profits go to big foreign corporations often leaving locals with denuded lands and little or no money. Clean Water Our first effort was to understand the water and sanitation situation in the village. A villager (Takor Tambe), a Peace Corps volunteer (Carybeth Reddy) and a Portuguese architect working on a project in the area (Rogerio Costa) volunteered to help. In February 2014 they began a survey of the water sources utilized by the village and the type of sanitation. Most families got water from wells and had pit latrines. Takor, Cary and Rogerio surveyed and mapped 120 wells and 3 springs which are all the water sources in the village. For each well they measured the size & depth of the well, type of construction, water depth and location of pit latrines. The water depth gave us a map of the ground water during the dry season. They returned and measured the ground water depth again in the rainy season.

In March 2014 Huck Rorick, Executive Director of Groundwork, traveled to Cameroon and brought with him water test kits to test for bacterial contamination as well as a computer for use by local villagers working on the project. Water quality tests were done with 6 different families. Water was tested at the well and again at their point of use. We needed an incubation room for the test medium so one of the villagers provided a room in his house which became our laboratory. The test results were then shared with the families. The results showed serious coliform contamination. This was not a pleasant result to share. Fortunately, we had one possible solution that is easy and affordable to any family in the village. Families can use

Map of all the wells, springs and latrines in Besongabang. Buildings are white, latrines red, wells & springs are blue.

Petrifilm E-Coli test plate. Red dots with gas bubble indicate coliform colonies. Blue spots indicate e-coli bacteria associated with feces.

a measured amount of household bleach in a measured container of water. The chlorine in the bleach will kill the bacteria and the water is safe to drink. We showed the families how to do this using the cap from their bleach bottle to measure. Since people often require a lot of follow up when adopting new behaviors we checked back later to see what they were doing. We were told that the families had adopted this disinfection procedure as part of their regular routine. We attribute that success to the close involvement with the families in doing the testing from preparing the initial test, incubating and seeing the results. We are now in the process of testing all the remaining wells in the village with the families using each well. Huck also brought a sample of water back to the U.S. for testing for metals and contaminants other than coliform. The results did not show other problems. The complete well and water quality survey with maps, and tables of measurements for all water sources will be made available soon in a separate report. Link to come. We are now in the process of designing and costing different water handling alternatives from very cheap and simple systems with safe storage containers (with lids to prevent contamination entering container and faucets to avoid dipping into the water for use) to systems with hand or electric pumps, piping and elevated storage, disinfection and possible filters. A separate report is available on the options being explored. Link to come. Sanitation, Options A key challenge in sanitation is to avoid contaminating the ground water that people drink. With average ground water levels of 1.2 meters in the rainy season the cheapest solutions of pit latrines and septic tank leach fields will contaminate the ground water. Out water testing and survey of the wells and pit latrines shows that this is happening now. An array of options that we considered is available in a separate report. Link to come. At the moment the option we are most seriously considering is the 2-bin composting toilet. The toilet has 2 chambers. The first is used until it is full in about a year. Then the second is used. After a year the material in the first chamber has composted and can be used to improve

Takor Tambe (village resident working with project) and Carybeth Reddy (Peace Corps) sharing test results from e-colite bag with Enow William (village resident who also provided our "lab").

the soil. This system the advantages that it doesn’t contaminate the ground water and it provides soil amendments to improve plant growth. We are considering urine diversion as part of the toilet because the urine contains most of the nitrogen and is mostly pathogen free so it can be applied immediately as fertilizer. It also reduces odors and makes composting easier.

We will be exploring other options as well. Wood Cook Stoves Almost all people in Besongabang cook with wood on 3 stone fires. A few have kerosene or gas stoves. As noted, 3 stone fires in unventilated spaces lead to serious health problems. Improved cook stoves have a number of advantages. They use less fuel. This means less cutting of wood, less deforestation, and less work collecting fuel. They release less pollution into the air both because they use less fuel and because they more efficiently burn the fuel they use. They release fewer global warming pollutants. We are looking at gasifier stoves which are amongst the most efficient stoves with the lowest emissions. These stoves can also produce charcoal (or “biochar”). The biochar is a beneficial soil amendment and when placed in the soil

Diagram source: CAWST

Photo source: http://sylvantutch.co.uk/index.php/twin-composting-toilet-unit.html

stores carbon so that these stoves have the potential to reduce the carbon in the atmosphere and reduce the risks of global warming. To be successful stoves need to look at their most important human side, i.e. food and how people relate to it. What people like to eat and how they like to cook. And that includes the social aspect of cooking and eating. Some discussion of how and what people cook and how they socialize around food and cooking is at this link: Pearly’s Kitchen Report The way people gather wood and the type and quantity they use is discussed at this link Pearly’s Firewood Report Some people use locally made sawdust stoves that are similar in some ways to the gasifier stoves we are considering. The fact that they are making these locally suggests that we can set up local manufacture of gasifier stoves. These can also use sawdust. They will increase efficiency and reduce smoke and air pollution. See Pearly’s Sawdust Stove Report. A few initial ideas for kitchens are shown here with more details at this link: Kitchen Ideas. These ideas are a starting point for discussion with the villagers and have already been modified. We’ll show more ideas as they evolve.

One of the first things we will do is build a demonstration house. We do that partly so that people can see something tangible on the ground which we think is a strong motivator and gets people interested and engaged. It is also an educational tool for us. It is not critical that the first house be completely “right”. We will build the first house for our project team to use during the course of the project and it will go to the village when we leave. Why do that? There are several reasons:

1. If the first house is for our use it must be something that we are happy to live in ourselves. At least some of our team come from wealthy countries and are used to many conveniences that local people do not have. Having to live in what we design is a good quality check for our team. It is also a message to the local people. Sometimes when we suggest a very low cost solution people may feel this is only being suggested because they are poor. If it is something we are recommending for our own use then it may be seen differently.

2. If we build for our own use we are not telling people what they like or should like. We are showing them what we like. They can look at it and decide if it looks good to them or not. This teaches us very concretely what people want and it gives people a chance to look at new ideas and maybe ways of doing things they hadn’t considered.

New housing developments often build a “model home” that people can look at before buying. “Green” builders have built demonstration homes showing the most advanced ideas in environmentally innovative design. People can see these ideas. Some they will like and will adopt. Others they will not adopt for a variety of reasons: to costly, not attractive, etc. Education, Skill Building Education and skill building is an integral part of what we do. Much of the educational aspect is “on the job” learning. We expect the villagers as well as our specialists to learn a lot from the process of working together to create the houses, infrastructure and community. Groundwork brings in high level specialists to help find solutions to the community’s needs. Their goal is to transfer as much of their knowledge and expertise to local people as possible. We expect many of the skills and techniques utilized in creating the houses will lead to small local businesses and industries. Although our simple goal is to make good houses in a good community there are lots of different pieces to this work.

UAC has proposed creating a rural development school. We have imagined this as a “Hands On University” where the process of researching, designing and building is the context of teaching. Community Orock Thomas, head of UAC, was born in the area and has close relations with the residents, organizations and local government in the villages where we will work. In March we met with the traditional tribal council for Besongabang, the Mayor and City Council of Mamfe, the largest town in this area, and the Mayor and Councilors of Eyumojock, a large sub-division of Manyu Division with 80,000 population in 64 villages, some remote and accessible only by foot.

Mamfe City Council Meeting. Mayor speaking (left picture) and Village Chiefs (right picture)

There was enthusiasm from each of the community groups we met. Each group wanted to have the first demonstration built in their community. Groundwork provides technical assistance. We rely on the local community to provide the financial and material resources. Each community offered to provide land, labor and access to local raw materials which is what we believe is sufficient to produce a high quality project based on local resources and very little cash. Project Team In Country Team UAC, United Action for Children, Orock Thomas, Director Rogerio Costa, architect Carybeth Reddy, Peace Corps volunteer Takor Tambe, village resident working on the project Pearly Wong, UN University, Groundwork volunteer International Advisers ARUP Engineers

Stephen Litsas, PE, LEED GA Yana Waldman, PE, LEED AP, Senior Engineer, Civil Infrastructure Jennifer de Bruijn EIT Cheyenne Waldman, PG, Geologist

Harold Leverenz, PhD, Civil Engineer, Lecturer UC Davis, waste water specialist. Paul Anderson, “Dr. TLUD”, engineer, gasifier stove specialist Marlo Martin, Physicist Roxanne Clement-Rorick, M Public Health, research assistant Huck Rorick, architect, Groundwork Institute Executive Director.

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Besongabang Traditional Tribal Council meeting with Groundwork and UAC regarding the housing project.

i . World Health Organization (WHO). (2008). Safer Water, Better Health: Costs, benefits, and

sustainability of interventions to protect and promote health; Updated Table 1: WSH deaths by region, 2004 ii CIA World Factbook https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-

factbook/rankorder/2102rank.html