“Mamas making up the Ernas Women’s Association have tapped onto a creative initiative to boost their everyday income, at the same time promote tourism development within their area, when they decided to build a house using much cheaper and affordable materials which will be used as a training centre.
The wall of the house is made from sacks filled with soil stacked together. “This is the cheapest we could afford”, Joseph said. She said they have been building the house for two weeks already, as they were delayed due to bad weather. “We work from Monday to Friday starting at 9am and finishes at 3m, scheduling such a time to allow us to prepare our children for school each morning, and cook meals for our families in the afternoon”.”
Read the rest of the story at Vanuatu Daily Post
This house was just featured on local TV. Also, this group built an earthbag cistern to capture water for construction. The bond beam is almost finished.
I’m impressed with the apparent quality of the bag work.
Judging from the photo, the Mamas should do more than simply sell their produce, handicrafts, and sew island dresses as the article references. Perhaps these women are better at Earthbagging than men. It seems they are paying attention to the construction details and following through consistently. If that attitude continues to all aspects of construction they may run a few male builders out of business if they build more structures for others.
If they can build better quality, I say good for them and let the best builder thrive.
It seems that others recognize the abilities of Vanuatu women.
http://www.ausaid.gov.au/HotTopics/Pages/Display.aspx?QID=412
Awesome :)
I want to do the same :)
The locals in Vanuatu are very excited about this project and earthbag building in general. I’m getting lots of positive feedback. Let’s hope they get the roof on okay before a big rain hits.