ethical junction

It is a new and unique collaboration between

• international aid agencies
• some of the world’s best eco designers and sustainable builders
• dynamic social enterprises and
• community-interested, philanthropic and / or socially-responsible investment

Ecoshelter provides eco-building, education and livelihood programmes suitable for

• disaster relief (eg after earthquakes and tsunamis)
• humanitarian relief (eg after wars and conflicts)
• poverty relief (eg community development projects and ecobuilding in favelas, shantytowns and slums)
• environmental relief (eg after floods, droughts and desertification as well as ecoliving and ecotourism developments)

Our mission is to help turn disaster, adversity or misfortune into opportunity and to encourage others to make the most positive impact on climate change – by changing the way that they live, from the buildings they live in to the way that they bring food to their tables and take care of their other needs.

• Our vision is to create and promote self-sustaining model communities which
• empower disadvantaged people and support them as they seek to build decent lives
• make best use of locally abundant resources (saving cost and effort)
• do not harm the environment (so that it will sustain people long-term)

Ecoshelter’s “whole systems” approach for both disaster relief and community development includes

• community empowerment / self governance
• sustainable shelter solutions (eg ecodomes, straw bale, compressed earth blocks)
• renewable energy (eg solar, wind, other)
• food (eg permaculture, livestock)
• water (eg playpumps, filtration, harvesting)
• sanitation (eg ‘tree bogs’ or other compost toilets)
• appropriate technologies (eg solar cookers, solar LED lighting, water harvesting)
• education & training (eg ecoshelter building, livelihood skills, training of trainers)
• development of Co-operatives, Microfinance, Micro-enterprise and Micro-franchise opportunities.