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Twalakula pa phone initiative brings you housing and sanitation solutions that will preserve the underground water and reduce the spread of diseases. The housing initiative avails you with building plans, housing designs and detailed bill of quantities (BOQs) that will help you effectively plan for your housing project based on your budget. The climate smart resilient housing initiative is a product of the Housing Bureau agreement signed in 2022 by Civic Forum on Housing and Habitat Zambia (CFHHZ), the Zambia Institute of Architects (ZIA) and the Zambia Institute of Planners (ZIP) towards supporting communities and citizens to build in a coordinated approach while upholding the regulated building guidelines. ZIA will support communities and individuals with architectural technical support while ZIP will help with planning and facilitation of approval of plans in line with planning guidelines by the planning Authority. This intervention aims to eliminate the continued demolitions of structures that have been built without planning permission. The consortium takes cognisance of the cost of building and the time invested and the pain for the loss caused by demolitions. The illegality of building in an undesignated area such as water path ways, land reserves is mainly due to lack of information on procedures to be followed when developing housing projects.  Twalakula will provide and support communities and individuals on the required information to ensure every investment is secured without any threats of demolitions and displacements. In addition, the initiative will continue to pursue research and development that will enhance preservation of the environment through safe sanitation practices and affordable construction methodologies using available building materials. In the wake of climate change, Twalakula has also partnered with the academia under its research and development to explore avenues that would promote access to alternative building materials that are affordable. The initiative is promoting the use of soil stabilised blocks technology (SSBT). The SSBT blocks are solid blocks which provides them unique characteristics compared to conventional brick and mortar. Owing to them being solid blocks, they act as insulators both during the hot and cold season thus making the internal temperature variations low regardless of the external conditions. The technology also reduces the construction cost by 60% on the super structure and uses less cement a high carbon emitting substance during construction.

Twalakula through the auspices of Civic Forum on Housing and Habitat Zambia (CFHHZ) has partnered with Simply Sanitation to support construction of sustainable pit-latrines and developed a bio-enzyme that reduces pit-latrine and septic tank content while killing up to 99.9 % of pathogens that cause Cholera, dysentery and typhoid. The Lat-cure bio-enzyme has been tested by National Institute for Scientific and Industrial Research (NISIR) and the South African Bureau of Standards (SABS) confirming that compounds contained in the Bio-enzyme are effective to dissolve bio-matter, reduce the pit-latrine and septic tank content while preserving the environment and the underground water.  This social enterprise and product have been birthed through the data generated since 2020 from the housing clinics (surveys) that Civic Forum on Housing and Habitat Zambia has been conducting around the country that examined the adequacy of housing and related services. It was established in all the seven (7) provinces where the survey was conducted that among the many challenges that communities faced was poor sanitation and contamination of the underground water that led to rapid spread of water borne diseases. Lat-cure will help you kick away Cholera, typhoid, dysentery and related diarrhoeal diseases, reduce the foul smell, flies and cockroaches that invade your pit-latrine and septic tank, while enabling you to manage your septic tank and pit -latrine content thus drastically reducing on the cost of emptying. 

Twalakula will help you adequately plan for your housing needs and make every saving count towards your realisation of accessing decent shelter and safe sanitation. You can save as low as K1 per day and join any saving group of your choice and pool your resources towards attainment of your dream home. Twalakula will facilitate linkages to established mortgage lenders such as the Zambia National Building Society (ZNBS), to ensure clients’ savings are secure and individuals should not worry about losing their savings but look forward to building their dream house incrementally with the desired peace of mind. The platform has five (5) different protypes measuring between 29.6 square meters (sqm) and 145 square meters (sqm) which clients can choose from. The platform is also open to help clients that have their own house plans but would require development of BOQs to help them plan adequately for their housing projects.