South Asia Research Institute for Policy and Development, SARID, is a non-profit (tax exempt) 501c3 US based corporation [EIN: 55-0829216], dedicated to various kinds of charitable work. Initially SARID was focused on development issues in South Asia only - but now we work globally. Our work in the past has focused on teaching affordable and sustainable building strategies for poorer communities. Our building strategy promotes use of locally available resources, local manufacturing, employment generation, sweat equity participation, and phased growth. Buildings we have built in the past,for the most part, do not use fossil fuel for heating and / or cooling. They are energy efficient, affordable, and have compartively a smaller carbon footprint.Given emergence of Covid -19 we are currently trying to help poor countries fight the impact of Covid-19 pandemic. We welcome the opportunity to collaborate and partner with other non-profits and foundations in building a more climate responsive and "Greener" world. (Note: Most of the engineering services have been provided by EcoHabitat, Inc. and / or Javed Sultan on a pro bono basis. Also some of the links on our website may not be working. Our Apologies. We are in the process of upgrading our website.)
If you need to contact us, please send us an email at:
info@saridweb.org
or call us at our USA Tel: +1(781) 315-1105
If you have questions regarding our non-profit work, or any other related question, feel free to send us an email at
info@saridweb.org or donate@ saridweb.org,
Please click below to see projects in which EcoHabitat-Kinoo engineers helped design our buildings for poorer communities:
We would like to also thank all our supporters and donors, without whose help we would not have been able to do our humanitarian work. We want to single out the Architects and Engineers of EcoHabitat Inc. and Kinoo Inc. who over the years designed many of our award winning buildings on a pro bono basis. These structures include the flood resistant home for Katrina victims in New Orleans, that won the design award from the city's engineering society; the tsunami shelters in the Bay of Bengal to protect people and animals from 30 feet high tidal waves; or the zero-energy home for elderly poor in Lesotho - the coldest region in Africa with sub-zero temperatures - and which home for the past 5 years requires little to no fossil fuel heating during winter (naturally heated) - and which project later won the global award from MIT Climate Colab for both "Buildings" and "Adaptation"; or the design of earthquake resitant (EQ) homes in Kashmir, built for the Aga Khan Foundation, that utilizes a unique non-wood (elastic) and /or non-steel solution to build affordable highly resistant EQ structures - that utilizes inexpensive, low carbon-footprint locally available material that incorporate dampening with elasticity to render these structures EQ resistant. We thank all of you for your help. Read about these projects here on our website.
You can watch a video of some of SARID's building projects, by clicking below.
- Flood Resistant Home in New Orleans, USA - Earthquake Resistant Affordable Homes Chinari, AJK, Pakistan - Energy Efficient, Insulated Affordable Buildings in Hot Climate, Karachi, Pakistan .....and many other interesting articles ....
Rebuilding Haiti (Part 2) - Five weeks on the groundAfter the first visit in 2012, SARID returned to Haiti in spring of 2013 and spent 5 weeks building a prototype structure ........
Rebuilding Haiti (Part 1)SARID in 2012 surveyed the ground conditions in Haiti to assess how it could help.....Read Full Article
Building energy efficient homes in hot climate and in flood zones (New Orleans - Above Right)
In 2007 the mayor of Karachi asked SARID to build a prototype affordable two bedroom home, using their "MASS" technology in a slum area of Karachi, Pakistan. Karachi has extreme hot weather, with temperatures reaching 110 Fahrenheit in summer. SARID engineers design/ built an affordable soil cement home with insulated walls, made of waste styrofoam (EPS) boxes. The walls have an average "R" value (heat resistance value) of 20. In comparison a twelve inch thick masonry walls (uninsulated - the norm in Karachi) has an "R" value of less than 1.5 at best. The higher the "R" value the higher insulation value. Homes in USA have typically "R" value of 14. The home was designed with an internal courtyard to further leverage micro-climate advantages in a humid and and very hot part of the world. The mayor later innaugrated the home.
SARID's response ... construction of homes and infrastructure
in affected areas [more]
NEED
FOR A NEW APPROACH TO BUILDING STORM SHELTERS FOR BANGLADESH - Sarid - Bangladesh blessed by nature with its fertile alluvial
plains, rich and picturesque rivers, is also host to violent cyclones...Full
Article
SARID's CASE STUDY: DISASTER AVOIDANCE AND MITIGATION - BARGUNA, BANGLADESH;- “MASS” TECHNOLOGY, Sustainable and “Green" Tsunami Resistant Shelter (TRS) proposed for a village in a high risk Tsunami prone coastal area of Bangladesh. The shelter was designed by SARID engineers in collaboration with engineering professors of Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET) and USA based structural engineers. A local charity helped coordinate SARID's efforts with local officials and villagers.
SARID's engineers visited the village site, after a major Tsunami event in November 2007 identified as the cyclone Sidr, had practically wiped out the village. It was one of the worst natural disasters in Bangladesh's history. It killed thousands of people. An earlier Tsunami triggered by an earthquake in 2004, had killed over 250,000 in several countries - those living along the coast of Bay of Bengal and Indian Ocean. It was found that, at least in the case of cyclone Sidr people had adequate warning days before the cyclone touched ground, and the anticipated Tsunami some four to six hours before it hit the shoreline. They had heard learnt of the cyclone through multiple channels including television, radio, texting on mobile phones, and village elders. However, people had no where to escape to. Bangladesh's terrain is mostly flat, and the average difference in height between the low and high elevation from seashore to thirty miles inland is typically only about five feet. When a Tsunami hits the shoreline, in extreme cases in Bangladesh, waves can be anywhere from 18 feet to 24 feet high. The waves do recede in height as they move inland. Hence, there are no higher ground or hills to escape to. Also both humans and livestock need to be saved, as livestock are essential for the rural economy. If famers lose their animals, in more cases than not, farmers go bankrupt. More often than not they abandon their village to look for employment elsewhere - to start a new life. Villagers indicated that the only way to save themselves during the Tsunmai was to climb up a tree, which the elderly and the young could not do - hence the higher mortality among the elderly and the children. The villagers were also hobbled by the fact that in order to escape the Tsunami they needed to walk miles with their belongings, through paddy fields, to reach paved roads and transportation. People in Bangladesh do not have the money to build individual homes on stilts or highly resilient buildings that would be able to face the Tsunami. Hence SARID felt that the solution lay in saving the villagers as well as their animals. Hence, SARID proposed protective TRS - for groups of people and animals, located within the confines of the village itself. The TRS would also store emergency food, water, medicine and other supplies for at least a week until such time that help could reach them. The TRS would be served by mobile clinic, medical personnel and veterinarians, and perhaps would have a helipad for air ambulance. In future the TRS could be served by drones - as drones will soon become a reality, for food and medicine drop. During normal times the shelter would serve as a local school, a medical clinic, and if need be village administrative offices. Such satellite TRS could dot the coastline and would be a less expensive option than building sea walls or dikes. Local villagers were very keen on the project, and donated some three acres of their land for the project, but SARID was unable to raise some US $150,000 to build the prototype demonstration shelter. The project, we believe, would have also introduced a new affordable construction system that would have generated local employment and various cottage industries. Image below shows a 3D axonometric and plan layout as well as SARID engineers discussing the project with villagers.
Safe shelter to protect against natural disasters, by Maryam Omidi, Minivan News, Maldives: A multi-purpose safe shelter is being built on Muli, Meemu atoll to shelter around 1,000 people in the event of a natural disaster. The building will be used for community activities on a day-to-day basis but will be equipped to shelter people from earthquakes, tsunamis, and wind speeds up to 40 per cent higher than that specified for Maldives coastal areas...full article
Hard Place; Sri Lanka, developing countries, face more challenges and poverty from downturn: economistsi,, Lanka Business online: While developed countries are facing economic contraction, developing nations are facing increases of absolute poverty, with some countries like Sri Lanka having little fiscal room to maneuver, economists have said. A global economic crunch from a collapsing housing, financial and commodity bubble was slowing 'economic growth' worldwide, with world growth expected to be just 0.5 percent in 2009...full article
A walking tour around the slums of Mumbai,by Victor Mallet, Financial Times, London - My first sight of Dharavi, the part of Mumbai reputed to be Asia’s largest slum, was as unlike the conventional tourist tableau of India – all snake charmers and sadhus – as it is possible to witness. On a smouldering garbage dump above a mangrove swamp on the slum’s edge, men squatted here and there with tucked-up loin cloths, defecating in the morning light. Mangy dogs skulked between mounds of construction waste and household rubbish...full article
SRI LANKA: World Bank housing project found wanting,IRIN News (UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs) - When Typhoon Nisha lashed northern Sri Lanka in the last week of November 2008 it caused extensive damage to the roofs of thousands of newly constructed homes, forcing the World Bank to reassess the type of roofing used in its multi-million dollar housing projects. Jaffna, 400km north of Colombo, was hit hardest, according to the National Disaster Management Centre...full article
Urban poverty, climate change and built environment,by Huraera Jabeen and Fuad H. Mallick, The Daily Star, Bangladesh - Designers of built environment can contribute in three areas for improving living environment for the urban poor: in building design; in settlement planning and design as well as in urban planning. Within these three areas they are to work with housing standards, environmental sustainability, economic affordability, structure as well as aesthetics for individual structures. Issues like infrastructure development, upgrading and designing community facilities affect ability of the urban poor to improve their living environment...full article
Alternative Construction Methods May Put an End to Price Hikes Say Experts, by Ahmed Maged, Daily News Egypt – CAIRO: If cheaper building techniques based on a new scientific approach are used in construction, costs would be cut down by 10 percent for each square meter, Housing Minister Ahmed El Maghrabi said at a conference last week. “We build 300,000 units annually over an area of 40 million square meters. But if we manage to reduce... full article
Industry Calls for Push to Affordable Housing, Sindh Today - Describing the government’s decision to provide 5 percent interest subsidy on housing loans taken by the economically weaker sections (EWS) as ‘a move in the right direction’, an industry lobby Sunday said it would boost demand of affordable housing. The prevailing high interest rate has dampened the overall demand and has severely affected the affordability, thus making housing a distant dream of a common man... full article
Older
articles from the Index page can be found in Recent
Affairs
If you shop at Amazon, please consider adding us as your favorite charity. To do so automatically, click below:
https://smile.amazon.com/ch/55-0829216
or, click below
WE NEED YOUR SUPPORT TO HELP FIGHT COVID -19
Thank you in advance for your generous support and tax-exempt donation. Help us fight Covid-19. If you prefer ou can mail your check to:
SARID, Inc. 66 Middle Street Lexington, MA 02421, USA, or do a direct deposit to Sarid's Bank Account at Digital Credit Union (DCU), Lexington, Massachusetts Routing No. 211391825 and Checking Account No. 41467713;
or if you like to pay (donate) with a credit card, or Paypal, click on the "Donate" button below.
Thank you !
(SARID is a 501c3 non-profit corporation.)
EIN: 55-0829216
Please click "Donate" below to proceed:
Sincerely,
Board of Directors, SARID Inc.
The above chart shows how we spent the donation you gave us (see chart above). SARID’s officers and Directors have received zero compensation. They work pro bono and helping reduce administrative and overhead expenses. Any and all technology developed by officers and directors are available to SARID free of charge. Also EcoHabitat Inc., and Kinoo Inc., have provides financial support, and Architecture/ Engineering services pro bono (free of charge). Also ote even though Although the above chart shows financials through 2014, we have continued to keep our overhead expenses to less than 5% through 2020.
Sisters of Charity of Ottawa - Lesotho and SARID have partnered in fight against Covid 19. Images coming soon.
SARID is also in discussion with various organizations to launch several projects in Lesotho. We will launch these projects once funds are in place. We have the land for the projects.
Building a Stable Future: SARID’s Sultan Develops Quake-resistant
Housing,by Tusha Mittal,
India New England - Many
organizations spoke with Ms. Nazmeen Butt, but she says
the results remained on paper. Lots of people came, but they only did file work,” she says. “They took our pictures, take our data, but no one came back to give us anything.” That changed when she met
Mr. Sultan Director of South Asia Research Institute for Policy and Development (SARID), a nonprofit organization based in Cambridge, Mass...full article
" Food production in over 70 acres - with bumper harvest anticipated "
Our food production effort in Lesotho is going very well. Landlords have partnered with with SARID and SCO to help in food production to help the poor and vulnerable.
Over 70 acres are in full production - growing wheat, millet, corn and vegetables. Below, images from our field.
Periodic food distribution to the poor, unemployed, and vulnerable
Demonstration home designed by SARID for the poor in Lesotho, and other poorer countries, wins MIT Climate CoLab's 2018 global contest for "Buildings" and "Adaptation". It won two out of seven contest with over 500 proposals from all over the world. The home requires little to no fossil fuel heating (it is naturally heated), even in sub-zero temperatures.
Home designed by Javed Sultan, Executive Director of SARID, wins American Concrete Institute's (Louisiana Chapter) 2017 merit award for design of low rise structures in flood zones. The home offers a new approach to designing sustainable homes in flood prone areas.
Orphanage and Half-Way House for Amputees - project below # 030117. See preliminary concept (bird's eye view) below.
Also view earthquake resistant, non-wood, fire resistant, two and three bedroom affordable homes, built between 2006 and 2009 in AJK (Neelum Valley) Pakistan, for the Aga Khan Foundation. Click on Low Cost Housing link above.