The Zakat Foundation Hosts Successful Meeting on Earthquake Resistant Housing
March 4, 2010 - The Zakat Foundation of America, a Muslim charity, hosted a meeting at 2 p.m. today in Port-Au-Prince, Haiti, between Haitian community organizers and U.S. experts in earthquake resistant construction.
Assistant Mayor Phillippe Oriol, Haiti Senator Evalliere Beauplan, and Khalil Demir, executive director of the Zakat Foundation of America welcomed the group. Other participants included Dr. Roger Bilham, professor of geological sciences at the University of Colorado-Boulder; Dr. Rebekah Green, associate director at the Resilience Institute at Western Washington University in Bellingham; Dr. Martin Hammer, architect in Berkeley, California; Dr. Elizabeth Hausler, Director of Build Change, .in San Francisco, California, and Eric Cesal, of Architecture for Humanity, based in San Francisco, California
The group met from 2 to 4 p.m. At La Reserve Hotel and Restaurant located in Petion-Ville. About one hundred people participated in the event.
In his presentation Dr. Bilham called poorly constructed buildings, "weapons of mass destruction." His comment underscores that many of the deaths were due to buildings that collapsed because of substandard construction and building materials. Haiti is the poorest country in the Western hemisphere.
"This earthquake that just occurred is not the end of it for us...the way out of it is to build better," tweeted Karl Jean Jeune, who attended and live tweeted from the meeting.
"We are eager to move ahead in the rebuilding efforts," said Khalil Demir, the Executive Director of the Zakat Foundation. The Foundation, in Haiti since 2008, has made a long-term commitment to assist Haitians in building safer housing.
The Zakat Foundation in the News
"The Zakat Foundation is making sure the church is supplied with food and water on a regular basis. The church uses the supplies to feed up to 3,000 people daily, and the Zakat Foundation supplies food directly to some 700 orphans at a camp near the church."
"On Catholic Bishop Thomas Gumbleton of Detroit's recent visit to Haiti, (Executive Director) Demir said, he praised the Zakat Foundation's work and said he hopes to raise funds for its operations at St. Clare's. In addition to funds raised in the United States for its Haiti operations, Demir said, his organization has received funding from places as far away as Indonesia."
Information on Earthquake Resistant Construction
Zakat Foundation will provide resources for people to build earthquake resistant homes. We will continue to add resources.
- Global Container Partnerships
- Five Steps to Safe Homes
- Open Architecture Network: Residential Single Family
- FEMA Homebuilders’ Guide to Resistant Design and Construction
- Resource on various natural building materials and designs
- Seismic Safety in Adobe Home Construction
- Earthquake Resistant Construction of Adobe Buildings: A Tutorial
- Cement block and earth block plans used in El Salvador. (Spanish)
- Ed. Blondel, M. Construction & Maintenance of Masonry Houses
- Confined Masonry Network
- Earthquake Resistant Earthbag building
- An earth bag house constructed in Southern Haiti
Earthquake Resistant Housing
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