Eco-brick goes MUD!

We want to address the severe effects of construction-led deforestation in semi-arid rural areas. According to the LaFargeHolcim Foundation, 14 trees are used as firewood to produce around 3000 bricks needed to build a single house. In Maji Moto (Tanzania), if fired bricks keep being used for construction, the whole forest cover will disappear by 2030 threatening local communities’ livelihood. 

Our solution is to promote the use of Compressed Stabilised Earth Bricks (CSEB) as a sustainable alternative building technique through the creation of an eco-cooperative. This initiative, driven by a local NGO in Maji Moto, will provide training, CSEB machines as well as technical and financial support to members and villagers with the aim of eliminating the use of fired bricks and sustain local livelihoods. This solution will be essential in the mitigation of climate change effects and leading the ecological transition towards a more resilient future for rural communities.

The problem we are working to solve with our solution is the deforestation linked to the production of fired bricks. The excessive use of firewood is increasingly exacerbating desertification and the negative consequences of other climate change-induced extreme weather events (floods, landslides, drought, etc.). 

According to Global Forest Watch (GFW, 2018), Tanzania has an annual deforestation rate of 1%, which is twice the world rate of 0.5% per year. It is also estimated that 88% of the country’s total energy consumption comes from wood fuel. Therefore, the objective for rural semi-arid areas is to reduce felling used to produce fired bricks, releasing the pressure on the already very strained Tanzanian forest. 

The adoption of the CSEB technique at the local level, could alleviate the current situation especially, as the village of Maji Moto is constantly growing  and requiring  more sustainable and affordable houses and public infrastructures. This endeavour requires providing training and raising awareness which will be offered through the eco-cooperative.

Our solution is a local eco-cooperative focusing on implementing the use of CSEB as a sustainable alternative to the use of fired bricks. It will work for the benefit of the community at different levels. 

1. This space of production and innovation will be run by community members. They will be provided with specialised training, as well as access to the machines, to operate and expand the use of this technology. As they earn expertise and income from this activity, the cooperative will also support their own micro-entreprise initiative. 

2. Working as an innovation incubator, it will provide the community with an actual space/testing lab where different types of building materials will be tested and produced with the use of the CSEB machine. 

3. Residents will be able to directly acquire low-cost bricks produced by members, or hire the service of a trained member as technical consultant on their building sites. 

As a result, by providing access to CSEB bricks that use soil as the main material, residents will be encouraged to avoid using wood for the production of fired bricks, reducing pressure on the environment. The increase in environmental awareness will also foster new systems of care that protect local resources.

The eco-cooperative is directed at community members who are willing to come together to learn new skills and engage in an activity with strong medium- to long-term social, economic and environmental prospects and impact. This solution targets more specifically two local groups: 1) Families whose incomes rely on the production of fired bricks and whose future job opportunities are threatened by the exhaustion of local resources (to which they directly contribute through the making of fired bricks); 2) young workers who have limited access to semi- and skilled jobs and 3) the women groups who, as the main caregivers in the  household, are best equipped to run the cooperative, but also are the most in need of qualifying and recognised training enabling them to earn a living and improve the living conditions of their family. Through the eco-cooperative model, these groups can collectively gain knowledge and practice on future-proof and sustainable construction techniques. As such, not only are they equipped with a skill set allowing them to create a business and get skilled employment; but they also develop a competitive advantage by embracing and building expertise early on in an innovative market that explicitly contributes to the mitigation of climate change. 

The eco-cooperative will benefit the wider community by strengthening its social, economic and environmental resilience. Such an initiative promotes the use of locally-sourced materials to be used in construction, increasing the circularity of local economies as well as reinforcing the sense of belonging and environmental awareness of local villagers.

By building capacity and expertise, members of the cooperative can access better employment and/or establish their own business which can significantly improve the individuals’ and their household standard of living across generations. In the medium term, and depending on funding, the cooperative can introduce and train more members, intensifying in that way the virtuous circle described above. From an environmental perspective, the promotion of CSEB has the explicit goal of mitigating the destruction of local ecosystems and protecting the environment. Besides, the progressive replacement of fired bricks with CSEB means that homes and other buildings are of high quality standard, more durable and affordable. As a result, local communities become safer and more resilient.

This proposed solution is the result of field research in Maji Moto and previous community-led public building constructions, such as a health centre, a public toilet and a nursery classroom, introducing CSEB to the village. By actively involving the community in these projects, we were able to gain crucial perspectives on their needs in terms of accessing affordable homes, public facilities and infrastructure, but also regarding the future prospective and survival of the village. Additionally, such interactions allowed for the transfer of knowledge of the CSEB technique and the promotion of a more sustainable building culture, where innovative building techniques come together with the vernacular understanding of the territory, fostering thus, social and environmental justice.

Our solution aligns with the Solve Challenge objectives as a technology-based and community-led eco-cooperative focusing on the promotion of  innovative and sustainable building solutions. 

After in depth fieldwork realised within the community during February 2021 to measure the impact of the built prototypes, this solution is feasible in terms of community’s acceptance and willingness to include CSEB’s as part of the local building traditions. 

The establishment of the eco-cooperative is expected to expand due to the important growth the community is facing, enabling its inhabitants to keep growing by protecting their own resources and biodiverse ecosystems.

The proposed solution is a pilot initiative which will be developed  in collaboration with the Maasai community of Maji Moto (1800 inhabitants) in Northern Tanzania, and Enjetare, a local NGO focusing on the promotion of affordable and sustainable building methods. Over the past few years, several programmes featuring the properties and benefits of CSEB have been implemented through the construction of community-led public facilities in the village, which included workshops on locally-sourced earth materials with villagers and training on compressed bricks to construction workers. With the cooperative, we want to move on from the prototype phase and provide the community with the actual tools to develop their own CSEB building projects through more specialised training and support to micro-entreprise. Based on our initial research and potential funding, we estimate we could start with between 8 and 10 members running the day-to-day activities of the cooperative.

Although the CSEB technique was developed in the 1980s, its use has been fairly limited, especially in Tanzania where it has been employed primarily by wealthy, educated and foreign elites. However, due to the effect of the globalisation and diffusion of global standards, rural communities increasingly value modern architecture and have been very open to new technologies in the construction field, even when these are expensive and difficult to access and supply in remote areas (e.g. concrete block, corrugated roof sheets, etc.). As a result, CSEB technique is regarded as innovative because it is modern, technology-based (contrasting with ancestral and manual techniques such as adobe bricks) and produces better building materials (the use of the machine increases the strength and compressive capacity of the material). Besides, the combination of the use of a machine and of traditional material such as soil, is perceived as an even more appealing innovation for a former nomadic community like the Maasai.

Considering the appeal for innovation amongst the community, the use of CSEB technique could be a catalytic force to accelerate the ecological transition of the community towards more sustainable building practices. In addition, given the high social value attributed to modern buildings, the success of the eco-cooperative could be replicated outside Maji Moto, in other rural areas of Tanzania facing similar threats to their local ecosystems.

Currently: 13

 After the completion of previous CSEB prototype projects, 13 community members are fully trained and working as bricklayers or CSEB producers.  

In year 1 of the eco-cooperative: 50+ users including

-The cooperative’s staff (three skilled trainers, a consultant engineer, two officers managing the place and its logistics and a director and sub-director from the partner NGO = 8 people).  

-The cooperative members, considering between 8-10 trainees.

- Cooperative clients that will receive, according to their financial situation, micro-loans or funding to build their house with the CSEB technique. The number of initial clients will vary according to the load of work, estimating between 5 to 8 families (35-40 people). 

Upon the success of the pilot in year 1, we anticipate opening a network of eco-cooperatives at the pace of one village per year. 

In year 5: 1600+ users (c.320 in Maji Moto and similar estimated number of people in 4 other villages) including:

- Cooperative’s staff, around 15 people.

-A wide range of former cooperative members will have started working independently and actual members (around 130). The number of cooperative members could progressively grow as more highly skilled members could become part of the staff.

-A wide range of community neighbours, who have built their house with CSEB or are planning to do so, estimatedly around 30-35 families (175 people)

Indirectly, the whole community will progressively benefit from both the socio-economic and environmental impact of the cooperative’s activities.

In addition to the successful establishment of the cooperative in Maji Moto, we will measure the progress against our impact goals as follow: e.g.

- Leading sustainable innovation: Secure funding/income stream every year to improve the CSEBs machine and develop new and improved products and services, participate in local and global innovation competitions and prizes, etc.

- Diversifying: Development of annual/semi-annual community-led projects promoting environmental actions, visit to a set number of schools a year to raise awareness on local environmental issues, etc.

- Scaling up: Implementation of a set of indicators and standard processes to assess the feasibility and level of engagement of the community with the cooperative before, during and after the project (e.g. field research, meetings with the community, number of houses built with CSEBs, etc.).

- Process and technology standardisation: Implementation of KPIs on number of bricks produced per set periods of time, regular report on machine and staff performance, development of a quality and maintenance schedule and process, etc. 

- Knowledge and experience sharing: Participation in relevant industry events (online and in-person) and organisation of meetings with key NGOs and decision-makers in other regions to encourage the exchange and support global eco-cooperative initiatives.

Members by the starting date of the initiative:

-2 full-time members of Enjetare NGO (Director and sub-director)

-3 part-time members submitting the Solve's challenge Solution

-6 cooperative’s staff (three skilled trainers, a consultant engineer, two officers managing the place and its logistics).

Our team is best positioned to deliver this solution as we have been researching and working with this community since 2016. Due to the adverse outcome of desertification on the ecosystems and local communities, we have partnered with Enjetare, a local NGO, to open up access to alternative building techniques, aligned with the objectives of mitigating climate change. For that matter, we have built three community-led and sustainable public infrastructures. These facilities stand as an environmentally-responsible and affordable example of a building technique that can be easily replicated. In line with the positive response and engagement of the community, our team is now committed to translate these experiences into a practical capacity building model through the establishment of the cooperative. This will equip individuals with working knowledge of such a building technique and promote the creation of micro-entreprises.

Since the beginning, our team has been guided by Msafiri Mollel, a member of this community and director of Enjetare. His dedication to the sustainable development of his village, together with our expertise in architecture, environment and finance, drives the engagement of this team.

Diversity, equitability and inclusivity are the core values overarching what we do and how we do it. The three members submitting this solution are representative of a diversity of backgrounds and geographies in terms of education, as well as areas of expertise. Laia (Spanish) and Nancy (Tanzanian) are trained architects, with extensive experience working with the Maasai community of Maji Moto while Cécile (French) has a background in economics and project management and reporting. Our ethics of engagement is based on the recognition of the strength of local knowledge and the full participation of communities in the project that concerns them. This is why our collaborative work is built on Laia’s PhD research on locally-produced building materials and in-depth field work and community engagement activities. Besides, we are aware of our own limitations and therefore we welcome any opportunity to partner, exchange and learn from other NGOs, collectives, academic institutions and individuals to progress on our mission.

Our application to this year’s Challenge is reflective of our desire to see the last project of a multi-year initiative come to life. After several years working with Maji Moto’s community to promote the use of sustainable materials and the protection of the natural environment, we see a momentum to translate all the awareness built into real action to fight desertification.  For that matter, we need the support and full force of an institution like the MIT and the Solve programme, to increase the impact of our groundwork and field research via our proposed solution. Through the programme, we would be extremely grateful to learn alongside the network of Solvers who have already made a great impact. There is also a sense of urgency as Maji Moto’s subsistence, like for many villages in the region and elsewhere, is under serious threat due to the adverse effect of climate change. We are very confident our solution will have a tangible impact in Maji Moto and elsewhere as it can be easily replicated once adapted to local context.

We believe we need the most support for our solution on the financial and monitoring & evaluation front. On the financial side, we would need to work with MIT’s partners on a funding strategy which would provide us with a reliable and stable source of funding to deliver on our medium- and long-term goals (for instance establishing a new cooperative every year in a different village). 

In terms of monitoring & evaluation, we would greatly benefit from the partners’ input on how best measure the impact of our solution across the social, economic, environmental spectrum.

As part of our latest research conducted in Maji Moto and its region, we have been in contact with two organisations that would add value to the development and progress of the initiative. These are:

-Tanzanian National Resource Forum (TNRF) -nonprofit-https://www.tnrf.org/en

Such organisation based in Arusha Town, has extensive experience in working with settled Maasai Communities like Maji Moto, providing them with the tools to secure their livelihoods and protect their natural resources. Partnering with them would strengthen the cooperative’s management strategies and the access to funding. 

-National Environment Management Council (NEMC) -Governmental organisation-  https://www.nemc.or.tz/

NEMC’s  head officers in Arusha have already demonstrated interest in our tested compressed bricks, and partnering with them would help us in promoting its use, as well as addressing the educational programs and environmental campaigns. 

Also, we would like to partner with some MIT initiatives: 

-TATA Center (MIT) https://tatacenter.mit.edu/

We believe that the knowledge on housing and environment in relation with community development could benefit both with interesting exchanges to improve our initiative’s outcome and management. 

-Environmental Solutions Initiative (MIT) https://environmentalsolutions...

Its focus on community-centered solutions and the strong body of expertise would help us in successfully delivering our environmental initiative. 

Additionally, our strong link with the Bartlett Development Planning Unit (University College London) https://www.ucl.ac.uk/bartlett...

 is an opportunity for us to strengthen connections and look for partnership opportunities by creating initiatives such as fellowships or summer labs with our Solution project.