Climate Action Philippines Project #22706

A Safer Home for Slum Dwellers in Metro Manila

by Build Change

A Safer Home for Slum Dwellers in Metro Manila

Project Report | Jun 16, 2016
Step One for the Big One!

By Maribel F. Larracochea | Fund and Partnership Development Officer

Photo of a typical house

Build Change has launched the prototyping phase of our preventative housing retrofitting (structurally strengthening) project in the City of Makati in Metro Manila in April 2016. Makati City has several barangays comprised of informal settlements which are on or near an active fault line. A 7.2 magnitude earthquake is predicted to hit Metro Manila; and in Makati City alone, the earthquake can kill 2,300 and injure 7,500 people. We are currently prototyping our initial assumptions about people’s motivations and financial capacity for retrofitting, which will allow us to develop and test models that will facilitate voluntary retrofitting among homeowners.

Makati has been implementing disaster management and risk reduction activities; however, there is still a misunderstanding among residents about disaster risk and the means they can take to strengthen their houses.

Nita (not her real name), a 40-year old housewife, lives in a barangay in Makati City, which stands on an active fault line. Nita wants to conduct minor upgrades in her existing house, which is made mostly of wood and some concrete materials. She feels that an upgrade is necessary so she and her son can be protected in the event of an earthquake, especially since her husband works overseas and may not be with them when the big one happens. However, she does not know where and how to begin the upgrade and does not see it as an urgent priority.

In the coming weeks, Build Change will work with Nita and her community to take the first step to help make their homes safer in the event of an earthquake, as well as typhoon. Through your support, we will raise their awareness about the risk they face and encourage them to retrofit their existing homes. This is going to be an exciting journey and we look forward to providing you with further updates about our project in the succeeding months!

Another typical house

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Mar 8, 2016
Build Change Wins OpenIDEO's Resilience Challenge

By Maribel F. Larracochea | Fund and Partnership Development Officer

We are happy to inform our partners and supporters that Build Change was selected as one of eight winners of OpenIDEO’s Urban Resilience Challenge, out of 350 entries from all over the world. OpenIDEO asked the question, “how might urban slum communities become more resilient to the effects of climate change?” Build Change proposed to address this problem by helping families living in urban slums to retrofit their existing houses, which will help ensure their safety and prevent loss of lives, livelihoods and injuries when a disaster, such as typhoon or earthquake, strikes.

As one of the winners, Build Change will receive funding and design support from OpenIDEO. Our Director of Programs and Partnerships and one of our Filipino Staff Engineers will participate in a four-day boot camp in Nairobi, Kenya later this March to learn more about human centered design and how it can be applied in our project.

We are very excited about this opportunity, especially since this will complement the support you have extended and enable us to seek government approval of the retrofit guidelines. At the same time, this will help us to advocate our idea to the wider public and reach out to more partners who can help us to further develop and scale our program.

Build Change is currently coordinating with local organizations working in urban slums in Metro Manila who can help us reach out to slum dwellers. In the coming months, we will also coordinate with local universities to engage their students, as part of their academic on-the-job training requirements, in conducting building assessment, structural evaluation, and development of retrofit designs. We are also looking forward to integrating our team’s learnings from the design boot camp.

Thank you so much again for your generosity. Together, we will enable urban slum dwellers to better prepare for, withstand and recover from natural disasters.

Links:

OpenIDEO Winners

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