Pakistan's flood-affected communities can help build these low-tech shelters

FACED with record flooding in Pakistan, architect Yasmeen Lari is taking action to help the country's population. She has designed strong, inexpensive shelters that can be quickly built in the regions most affected by these storms. Inhabitants are involved in the construction of these makeshift homes made from bamboo.

Rain has fallen heavily since the start of the monsoon season in Pakistan, causing record flooding. One third of the country is under water, affecting an estimated 33 million people, or one in seven Pakistanis.

More than one million homes have been damaged or destroyed. The provinces of Sindh and Baluchistan, two regions in the south of the country, are particularly affected.

Emergency shelter, such as tents, are in short supply and are not sufficiently resilient in the face of the rain that is expected to continue. "Clearly, it has become imperative to devise low cost alternative approaches to provide shelter options which would include maximum participation of affected households themselves," Heritage Foundation of Pakistan, a foundation co-founded by Yasmeen Lari, outlines on their website in reference to flooding in 2010.

"Low-tech" shelters

Designed as panels that can be connected with rope, these shelters are designed entirely from bamboo. The constructions are low-cost and carbon-neutral. "The beauty of it is that it's low-tech," Yasmeen Lari told Fast Company. When not built on site, the shelters are sent to the regions impacted.

Pakistan's first female architect has been working on the material for more than a decade. She had first experimented with such structures during the 2010 floods, some of which were even elevated using stilts. Did they withstand the 2022 floods?

According to Yasmeen Lari, this process must involve the community affected by these floods. "It's a participatory process," she told Fast Company.

"These are not victims, they have to be a part of [the rebuilding process." Architecture media outlet ArchDaily reports that "targeted training modules are in fact offered for implementing partners, volunteers, artisans and communities."