BUILDACHANGE : WHO ARE WE ? BUILDaCHANGE [or BaC] is a non-profit organization [ONLUS], created in 2012 with the aim of promoting the right to an adequate and appropriate built environment as a crucial factor towards the promotion of an effective improvement on the living conditions of individuals.
BUILDaCHANGE intends to be an energy and knowledge catalyst and wants to use architecture as a mean to a concrete social promotion.
BUILDaCHANGE pretends and is able to act mainly in two areas:
• Making/Achieving quality architectural projects in Developing Countries independently and thrived by the desire to improve the living conditions of the most disadvantaged communities [from program definition to fundraising for the project implementation]. • Collaborating with organizations, institutions, communities already engaged in social programs by offering them the specific contribution linked to the development of the architectural project in the broad sense of the term.
BUILDaCHANGE [BAC] was born from the architecture office FAREstudio’s desire to make its contribution and its professional’s action in the field of social architecture and urban development within countries in the developing world more effective and direct.
After numerous experiences in the field of international cooperation, through BAC FAREstudio now wants to be at the forefront in the implementation of projects aimed at the use of building towards the social well-being, to ensure even the most disadvantaged populations the quality and comfort of an innovative built environment though at the same time linked to local traditions.
An example of FAREstudio’s work is the CBF [Centre pour le Bien-être des Femmes].
The CBF begins in 2006 through the initiative of the NGO AIDOS [Italian Association Women for Development] as a multi-purpose center aimed primarily for women from Sector 27 of Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso’s capital. The center provides hundreds of health care interventions each year, psychological assistance, legal advice, training sessions, information and awareness campaigns aimed mainly at women and girls, but in reality the entire community.
OUR ACTIVITIES
“Zero Project”, the first project of BaC, stems from the observation that a third of the world’s population does not have access to adequate sanitation.
The lack of good practices in terms of sanitation causes the spread of diseases and death of millions of people every year in many communities in developing countries. Zero Project started with the aim of contributing to the improvement of the quality of life of these communities through the design and implementation of a network of integrated self-sufficient public toilets technologically advanced urban cores [ISH_Improved Sanitation Hubs].
These cores internally integrate the different functions and components: 1. Provision of basic sanitation 2. Dissemination of innovative systems for the treatment and recycling of organic residues 3. Generating satellite economic micro activities related to the processing and sale of organic residues 4.Creation of a small urban area in which to concentrate simple technological services which normally are absent to peri-urban or rural communities; in the same area, mostly outdoors, will be held periodical educational seminars aimed at promoting hygiene 5. Monitoring through do-it-yourself technological instruments the system operation with the aim of facilitating its maintenance and management
The first Zero Project is to be created in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso’s capital, starting from the implementation of an ISH prototype for experimental and demonstration purposes. Our goal will be to involve local authorities and international organizations in order to replicate the prototype throughout the city and built up an Improved Sanitation Network_ISN, which is the real purpose of Zero Project.
WHY “ZERO PROJECT” In September 2000, 191 member states of the United Nations [UN] indicate eight "Millennium Development Goals" [MDG] to be achieved by the year 2015. Among them, Goal 7 aims to:
• Integrate the principles of sustainable development into country policies and programmes and reverse the loss of environmental resources • Halve, by 2015, the proportion of the population without sustainable access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation • Achieve, by 2020, a significant improvement in the lives of at least 100 million slum dwellers
Although the efforts of countless organizations acting in the field of international cooperation have greatly improved the situation within poorest countries, the achievement of the specified target in Objective 7 must be considered at least partially a failure.
The WHO [World Health Organization], the Organization of the United Nations that deals with the monitoring of data related to the world's population health, registers in its last 2014 JMP record [Joint Monitoring Program for Water Supply and Sanitation] the following data: • 748 million people still lack access to safe drinking water; • 2.5 billion people still have no access to an advanced sanitation system; • 1 billion people still have no alternative to defecating in the open air
Through "Zero Project" BUILDaCHANGE wishes to use its expertise in order to contribute towards achieving Objective 7, considered crucial to achieve an adequate level of health among the populations of the Developing countries, particularly among those settled in the territory of sub-Saharan Africa. In these countries, situated south of the Sahara Desert, there are in fact the most worrying data: only 27% of the population [105 million people] have access to adequate sanitation as indicated by the JMP 2014 report. Interventions in this area are extremely urgent. For this reason BUILDaCHANGE chose to build the first prototype of "Zero Project" in the peri-urban territory of Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso’s capital, where 3.4 million people have no access to clean water, 13 million people [82% of the population] do not have access to adequate toilet facilities and as a result some 12,000 children die every year before reaching the age of five. The prototype will be built just steps from the Centre pour le Bien-être des Femmes, created in 2006 by FAREstudio in collaboration with local and international NGOs with which, over time, has established close cooperation and collaboration.
WHAT IS « ZERO PROJECT » "Project Zero" identifies a starting point, a ground zero. "Zero" because it is the project from which BUILDaCHANGE chose to begin its mission;
"Zero" because the project aims to solve the problems underlying the need of every human being: access to adequate sanitation and safe sources of clean water, a clear priority to the prevention and maintenance of a good [minimum] health standard, is in fact scarce in the developing world countries.
The specific objectives of "Zero Project" are:
HEALTH OBJECTIVE: to equip rural and peri-urban areas of developing countries, with particular attention to the realities of sub-Saharan Africa, with efficient networks of public sanitation
Health sub-objectives: • provide, in addition to basic services, ancillary services such as washers, showers, drinking water tanks, waste collection containers • continuously monitor the physical health of the users of the toilets to improve medical prevention measures and to create "training" opportunities on the issues of personal hygiene and health
ENVIRONMENTAL OBJECTIVE: Enable a system of organic waste recycling that is sustainable and non-polluting
Environmental sub-objectives: • treat accumulated organic waste in order to transform them into natural fertilizers • make each ISH module self-sufficient in terms of energy and water through the use of renewable sources.
SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC OBJECTIVE: to provide the community with a wide range of services and enable a system capable of generating income for the community
Social sub-objectives: • design ISH modules in such a way that they are easily reproducible by local know-how • in addition to the main services [toilets and clean water], ensure the dissemination of basic technology services such as charging points for mobiles, accessible wireless hotspots, public lighting, etc • equip rural and peri-urban areas of small equipped open spaces available to the community
Economic sub-objectives: • be certain that the organic residues acquire economic value once processed into fertilizer • facilitate the creation of associations and cooperatives that take into hands the ISH modules’ management thereby deriving economic benefit from routine maintenance activities • rent the outer walls of the modules for graphical advertising and thus funding the maintenance of the modules.
"Zero Project" is a new way of doing things.
To achieve its objectives, BUILDaCHANGE intends to create an enlarged knowledge platform consisting of sociologists, urban planners, environmental engineers, WASH experts, doctors, makers [craftsmen of electronic equipment], economists, designers, representatives of local communities, social media & Crowdfunding experts , computer specialists, etc., in order to develop a pioneering project in which diverse skills can make their own informed contribution.
For this reason, "Zero Project" will be an open source project, consisting of sub-open source projects realized in collaboration with both professionals and non-professionals and which outcomes will be disseminated in the form of illustrative manuals. This will also guarantee the ability of communities not living in territories on which BUILDaCHANGE has intervened directly to realize its Improved Sanitation Hub. "Zero Project" would allow, therefore, new ways of managing projects in the field of international cooperation by removing the [widespread] logic of segregation: an open and inclusive approach, able to value ideas of heterogeneous disciplines, is, according to BUILDaCHANGE, the only way to really speed up the process of improving the living conditions of disadvantaged populations and allow them an active participation and knowledge of the process.
SMALL VARIATIONS, BIG CHANGES
"Zero Project" is a network of small built modules. Physical ones. Each module will be made from out of two distinct components:
• a 6x6m sanitation facilities block containing two toilets and two sinks for each sex and a 3x3m volume that can be customized according to the specific requirements of each community [showers, laundry, store, cloakroom, etc.]; • An exterior complementary space of the same dimensions as the sanitation facilities block, for the community use; this space will be made as to have night lighting, the opportunity to sit while waiting or relax, shading during the day, the ability to write and do homework on large slate surfaces etc.. A small volume will also house other ancillary functions: if and as required, for example, it can be used as a deposit, covered drying area, waiting space, place to electricity production equipment, etc..
"Zero Project" wishes to meet in an integrated way possible requirements of each community by providing, through minimal variations to the project, a wide range of different functions combined together. The expected output of "Zero Project" will be the creation of an ISN_Improved Sanitation Network, which creates a new territorial system of services where each module, containing specific functions, will be complementary to others made in the same territory. “Zero Project will thus have as a final result a network of active hubs, capable of producing and sharing information. Within each Improved Sanitation Network, each module will be able to collect and share useful information to the supervision and management of the entire system as, for example, data on influx, water and energy consumption, urine and excreta analysis, etc… Experience has taught us that all projects, in order to achieve satisfactory results, must be thought according to the principles of economic, social and environmental sustainability.
CONSTRUCTION AS A DEVELOPMENT ACTIVATOR « Zero Project » is a system where the role of construction is essential but only if included in a broader program. BUILDaCHANGE truly believes that to positively influence the level of welfare of the beneficiary communities, a building must be able to: • enable new social dynamics through the exchange of professional skills and human relations in the context of its design, construction and management. • be flexible to the demands of future beneficiaries also taking into account issues related to gender and persons with reduced mobility. • create the conditions for economic subsistence
"Zero Project" also aims at enabling mechanisms for social and economic empowerment within the forecasted three phases of implementation: • during the design phase of each Improved Sanitation Hub an iterative process of cooperation with communities for the development of the project, thus increasing the level of awareness of the entire workgroup; • During the construction phase, a team of local laborers will be trained and equipped as to be able to independently build other Improved Sanitation Hubs in the future. • during the management phase of each Improved Sanitation Hub, small income-generating activities will be started, such as the 'sale' of electricity, rental of advertising space, recycling organic waste, etc… "Zero Project" also aims at enabling mechanisms for social and economic empowerment within the forecasted three phases of implementation: • during the design phase of each Improved Sanitation Hub an iterative process of cooperation with communities for the development of the project, thus increasing the level of awareness of the entire workgroup; • during the construction phase, a team of local laborers will be trained and equipped as to be able to independently build other Improved Sanitation Hubs in the future. • during the management phase of each Improved Sanitation Hub, small income-generating activities will be started, such as the 'sale' of electricity, rental of advertising space, recycling organic waste, etc…
"Project Zero" will have economic benefits, both directly and indirectly. We believe, for example, that by improving the system for processing organic residues [urine and excreta] and their use for the production of electricity and / or fertilizers, as well as through the implementation of improved facilities, for every dollar invested a company may obtain an economic return of $5 by increasing the productivity of people, reducing health costs, preventing diseases, premature deaths and disabilities [Source: Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation]
