An article in the Swedish version of The Local (http://www.thelocal.se/48702/20130626/) heded Refugee homes as 'easy as an Ikea bookshelf' describes how Swedish furniture giant Ikea's charitable foundation has joined forces with the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) to design and build flat-pack shelters for refugee families.
Some time ago this blog had entries on converting 20-foot and 40-foot cargo containers for use as shelters. To this scrivener’s mind, this still is an excellent use for containers that are stacked too-many-high at most sea ports. (Mobile homes, a/k/a “caravans,” “factory-built,” and “trailers” also are used for temporary and long-term shelter, but unlike cargo containers, about the largest “facility” such mobile units can provide is 24-by-60 feet; OK for a small classroom or clinic, but small even for a mobile hospital.)
The problems with using containers are several:
- They have to be converted for their future use (e.g., homes, hospitals, schools) meaning adding
- Electricity
- Plumbing
- Insulation
- They have to be shipped to the disaster area; the best way to ship containers is on container ships which have two problems:
- The ships are relatively slow and
- The ships can’t deliver containers inland; ships and boats need waterways, not always available
The Ikea/UNHCR solution solves both of the container problems and may be more cost-effective than container conversion. The caveat: based on a video at The Local Web site (ibid), so far there is no way to expand a single dwelling to accommodate a common-use facility such as a school or hospital.
According to the article, The Ikea refugee shelters have been designed by a group of Swedish designers within the Refugee Housing Unit and are equipped with insulation and solar panels which provide enough electricity for lighting.
"Our goal is to revolutionize the refugee tent, or at least improve it," said Johan Karlsson of the Refugee Housing Unit in a film on the Ikea Foundation website.
In the accompanying video, Ikea engineers note that the housing units will be tweaked based on input from the refugees using the units.
"Quite frankly the tents have not much evolved over the years - they still rely on canvas, ropes and poles. They are hot during the summer and cold in winter," said Pierre Olivier Delarue of the UNHCR in the film.
Much of the temporary housing in refugee centres often has a life span of as little as six months and the typical white canvas style tent design has shown incapable of meeting the needs of refugees.
"On average a family will spend 12 years in a camp, so many children will grow up calling this shelter home," he added.
- A personal aside: I spend many summers in large Army surplus tents; they lasted much longer than 6 months, but required maintenance to patch leaks. It seemed that leaks happened faster than they could be patched. While there was screening and the tent flaps could be raised, inside still was stifling.
The UNHCR tents lack electricity and insulation. The Ikea units have a solar collector to power a provided electric light and they are insulated to keep heat out during the day and heat in at night.
"Quite frankly the tents have not much evolved over the years - they still rely on canvas, ropes and poles. They are hot during the summer and cold in winter," said Pierre Olivier Delarue of the UNHCR in the film.
"On average a family will spend 12 years in a camp, so many children will grow up calling this shelter home," UNHCR’s Delarue added.
In the video, two men are able to carry the flat-pack shelter – in its box – to a set up point. In addition to the shelter’s components, there also is a second container, light enough for one person to carry, containing metal poles and wires to support the structure. To raise the structure seems to be a three or four person task.
Unlike containers and mobile homes, refugees will need to be trained to set up the Ikea flat-pack units (unless UNHRC can hire hundreds of “builders” to quickly raise the roofs), but – based on the video – it seems assembling a unit can be accomplished with minimal, sho-n-tell training.
According to The Local, The refugee shelter project, into which the Ikea Foundation has poured some $4.5 million, remains at the prototype stage and the first batch of shelters are set to be tested by the UNHCR in a camp in Ethiopia.
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