Housing for All by 2022 – An Ecosystem Approach
 

In addition, the growing demand for housing is putting tremendous stress on the limited building material resources such as bricks, sand, timber and even water required for construction. The extraction process to obtain these materials leads to serious environmental damage through mining, river dredging, stone quarrying, timber extraction, soil excavation etc leading to mining restrictions on one hand and price rise on the other. In order to meet the current housing deficit alone, there is need for 350 million metric tons of cement, 20 billion fired bricks, 36 million tons of steel and 2000 million litres of potable water. There is an annual erosion of 350 million tonnes of top soil due to brick making activities alone in the construction industry.

With the current government’s promise of providing Housing for All by 2022, we are faced with dealing with a dual challenge of meeting these housing needs and dealing with the environmental impacts of the same. However, past and current government plans and programmes have not included greening by way of adopting eco construction practices i.e. efficient resource use in terms of water, energy and use of eco building materials and technologies . Thus there is a need to relook the current models to overcome these challenges.

To date, social housing initiatives of the government have not been able to meet this housing gap in either quantity or quality. Increasingly, private initiatives and community led processes are being encouraged to service the growing housing market of the poor both in rural as well as urban areas. However, the informal and disaggregated nature of this population throws up challenges for private sector as well as for institutional finance to service this ‘Bottom of the Pyramid’.

The two main challenges lie on the financial and technical ends of the spectrum of housing issues. Access to finance is tricky given the small ticket size of the loan required as well as the lack of credit worthiness of the borrowers. Banks are reluctant to invest the time and effort required to meet the micro-loan needs of affordable housing. The lack of securitisation due to inadequate paperwork and credit history compounds the problem.

On the technical end, architects and engineers are not often key stakeholders in the affordable housing space. Often this is owner driver and incremental dependant completely on availability of resources and need. Technical inputs on design are not sought and seen as an added cost without adequate ‘value add’ given the resource constraints. With respect to eco-friendly materials and technologies, inadequate demonstration and weak supply chains of eco-friendly technology options deter their adoption. Furthermore there are no incentives to users to adopt these measures.

Development Alternatives in collaboration with FEM Sustainable Social Solutions has created a revolutionary ‘housing eco-system’ that tackles the dual challenge. This housing model provides financial and technical services to the rural families through the ‘Build Together Pay Together’ (BTPT) process and the ‘TARA Karigar Mandal’ (TKM) services respectively. The client being the focal point, the model follows a systems approach to ensure its efficiency. The client is linked to the bank or any other financial institution through the 'Build Together Pay Together' process enhancing efficiency and finance procurement for them and ensuring timely repayments to the bank. Technical services are provided by the TARA Karigar Mandal (eco-artisan group). Eco technologies being used in the project are rat-trap bond for brick masonry, precast door window frames, micro concrete roofing (MCR) tiles for verandah and toilets and stone patti roofing for rooms and the kitchen. Development Alternatives provides capacity building to the artisans, enterprise development support to local entrepreneurs and market development for demand creation.

The urgency on account of market pressure and ecological degradation is now being recognised. Today, rural housing and infrastructure development are a high priority agenda for the Central and State governments of India. Their focus, combined with the heightened government sensitivity for the environmental impacts of economic activities has created a ripe business environment. A huge demand for housing with rural families willing to pay for services they value is creating a business potential for green construction products and services.

However in order to efficiently and effectively deliver these services, there is a need to facilitate the implementation of a sustainable habitat delivery ecosystem that meets the technical and financial needs of the community. Some policy recommendations to institutionalise this model are listed below.

Standardised designs are an effective tool to maintain quality and structural integrity of construction in the affordable housing space. Catalogues of standard templates with materials choices will help local stakeholders in constructing eco-friendly homes without incurring the high costs of architectural inputs. For projects to be successful, community ownership and buy-in are critical aspects. This is especially crucial during relocation projects. Sensitivity in planning and adequate inclusion of future home owners in the process are two ways to promote ownership.

A cadre of trained work force is required to deliver eco-friendly housing at scale. While masons are found across the country, training and capability building on eco-construction technologies is required to ensure continuous services and resource efficiency on lower energy consumption in building construction. Quality is another key component in the aggregation of green construction services. Standardised curriculum and a system for certified skills for masons and artisans will go a long way in monitoring and assuring quality. Common interest groups and guilds can be leveraged to strengthen this cadre of skilled personnel.

Adoption of eco-friendly building materials and technologies is directly related to the supply and availability of these materials. Micro enterprises that use local materials and provide local employment while servicing local demand are an ideal situation. They also promote the use of locally available waste materials in the product manufacture to promote resource efficiency. Encouraging the use of green building technologies by setting up green building enterprises also needs provision of technical support to local enterprises and training to local people in the production of the green building materials for roofs, floors, panels, frames, pavers etc.

Group housing systems such as Joint Liability Groups (JLG) to take loans help in financial risk reduction, bring efficiency in the construction process and ensure timely construction and loan repayment through group peer pressure. The JLG act as social collateral in the risk reduction process. This concept involves the strengthening of communities as institutions acting as a stable local mechanism that ensures that the objectives of the programme are attained smoothly. Provision of fiscal tools such as bridge funds help ensure proper delivery mechanism by providing cover on the fund cost for construction. Post completion the same will later be refunded by banks.

There of course is a need to customise the above tools and measures based on local cultural conditions.