GroPower

AGRIVILLAGE

Green-Field Agri-forestry requires the existence and co-operative parallel development of integrated human settlements, in order to function successfully.

1. Rural housing settlements in most of the target environments (in Southern Africa), are generally scattered and are not integrated into conventional village structures and are reliant mainly on subsistence agriculture, with some pastoral activity where the soils support adequate grazing.
   
   
2. BioFuel plantations have an ongoing requirement for plantation maintenance and crop harvesting, plantion extension, out-grower development programmes, crop processing, waste material recovery, processing, conversion and disposal, all of which add up to a requirement for a considerable labour force. This provides an ideal opportunity to create meaningful, sustainable employment, in these generally impoverished rural areas
   
   
3. Social Responsibility:
   Arising out of the need for a stable and adequately skilled and motivated labour force, a community development partnership is imperative; out-grower programme development and a wide range of related downstream and up-stream SMME development enterprises, can be expected to arise with the implementation of an extensive BioFuel plantation enterprise. This brings about an open-ended opportunity for Rural development and consequently, a wide range of simultaneous associated human capital (skills) development.

see pdf document available for separate download from this WebPage

Hende Wayela/ ZCSD Agrivillage concept

Small-scale demonstration of a quality home-building option can be seen in the successful manner in which the HAKA rural block-making enterprise has driven self-help rural community housing development in the KZN province in South Africa, over the past several years.

The pictures herewith (see below), show a typical robust, but well-finished demonstration building, in the typical rural African style, constructed at the HAKA works, in Umhlali, KZN Province, using minimal basic skills and incorporating a weatherproof, on-site built roofing system, with guttering for rainwater harvesting. 

The finished cost of this demonstration building is
less than R1000/ sq m (about US$125/sq m finished & painted).

The roof (picture below) is constructed on a light-weight galvanised steel framework with tensioned wires to support the hessian fabric base covering that is then saturated with a water-proofed cement plaster mis and then sealed with a bituminous weatherproof coating.

Example: 3m diameter "Rondavel" house; constructed with 400 x 200x 80mm hand-made cement blocks.

Building team of 2 -persons:

•   2 days to make the blocks
•   3 days to prepare foundation and lay the  Blocks and 1 day, to assemble and mount the roof frame and natural-fibre covering an door and window frames                
  
• 1 day to plaster inside and out and lay-on two coats of water-proof cement mix on the roof
• 1 day for painting
• 2 days for the (optional) water tank.

      Total: 10 Days to Completion.

Traditional indigenous houses and huts are generally made entirely from locally available natural resources. This sounds good and "eco-friendly"; The reality however is that this construction method gobbles up indigenous trees at an alarming rate, rapidly denuding the land, especially when coupled with the cutting down of trees for firewood.

The HAKA Block-built house (see pictures at bottom of page) modifies this utilisation of natural resources so that the cutting-down of trees is greatly reduced or eliminated. In this way, the natural environment is protected and the denudation of natural bush and forest is restrained.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/6760355/Southern-African-Huts-Homes  web pictures

http://www.360cities.net/image/traditional-zulu-huts-izingolweni  scroll-around panoramic views.

Typical Rural Homes:

The two pictures immediately below, are of typical huts. The walls are constructed of "wattle and daub", with thatched roofs. This traditional method requires the cutting down of saplings for the construction and denudation of the surrounding bush, leading to desertification of the land and reduction of the land's water retention capacity, once the natural vegetation has been destroyed.

The life of these structures may range typically, from 3 to 5 years; after which they are rebuilt, resulting in the further destruction of the natural vegetation. This can easily be prevented, when using the HAKA cement -block construction system that provides for a much longer building life-cycle (40+ years) and utilises only local sand and gravel for the wall-construction and can still be roofed using traditional thatch grass that can be sustainably harvested each year.

A superficial assessment of the traditional huts in these pictures (left) suggests effective use of sustainable local materials and low-impact on the local environment.

This is an INCORRECT assumption:

 To make a Rondavel, traditional house, made from wooden poles, cut from the local indigenous trees and assembled with mud-daub, a person will cut down around 30 trees. This house will only be good for around three years and they will have to be replaced due to insect-rot etc of the natural wood framing.

Building this house out of blocks this would eradicate the destruction on the environment by this builder not needing to cut down the trees.

Disadvantages of having a wooden house:

• Cutting down trees has a huge impact on the environment, reducing vegetative cover and
• Having to rebuild within 3 to 4 years due to weather erosion, wood rot etc and
• Fire hazard

Advantages of building a house with blocks:

Pictures below:
 [Traditional Round Hut built with HAKA cement blocks]:

The Water Tank in the picture (above), is constructed of hand-moulded, curved, solid cement blocks, laid in a cement grout and final-plastered with a water-proofed plaster-mix.

Rain-water harvesting can be achieved with this roof construction with it's galvanised guttering system (not available with traditional, thatched roofs). 

The Dirt-strainer / top cover is made from a standard polythene shade-cloth mesh stretched over a suitable frame (Polypropylene water pipe 20mm).