Through the Building and Construction Improvement Program (BACIP), Aga Khan Planning and Building Services has been able to reduce indoor air pollution in all target communities. Keys to their success include focusing on capacity building to insure integrated sustainable development, creating strong relationships and trust with community members thus empowering them, identifying unique characteristics of each community, and creating a reliable monitoring and evaluation process. Please read on for more information from Aga Khan's Faisal Khan.
What is the most exciting aspect of your work?
Availing opportunities to make real life contributions for thousands of families by improving their housing conditions gives me a job satisfaction that I had never felt before. I am most excited about the fact is that we are able to improve the indoor air quality, reinforce the building structure of a house, secure access to safe drinking water, provide fuel efficient and cost effective cooking and heating systems and build adequate sanitation facilities for impoverished households, all within a year.
What accomplishments are you most proud of?
Changing people’s perception about indoor air quality, removing myths and changing people’s behaviors. AKPBS’ Community Health and School Health programs promote behavior change messages. In addition, IAP is one of the key components of the organization’s Building and Construction Improvement Program. Interventions include a comprehensive assessment and a housing planning tool, as part of an integrated solution to improve housing conditions. It also makes me proud to see women and children benefit the most from our interventions as they spend most of their time indoors. Most amazingly, the positive energies that are generated by members of the household living in decent housing conditions can be witnessed in the positive changes in their attitudes and increase in their productivity.
How has PCIA helped you in your work?
PCIA has helped to prove the correlation between IAP and health by funding a study that is looking at impact of smoke exposure. PCIA has helped achieve a paradigm shift towards approaches for reaching out to communities. PCIA has also helped change the intervention models from a project oriented development program to a to a market driven enterprise model. The networking through PCIA is phenomenal as it has enabled us to access expertise that can help us in further design improvement of our products, testing new technologies, and seeking input from other specialists that have already contributed enormously in other parts of the world. In fact, PCIA membership has enabled us to join a distinct international community that shares our goals and is striving to meet similar objectives elsewhere in the world. Such networking has given a new impetus to our work!
What did you find most useful about the 2009 PCIA Forum?
The level of energy and enthusiasm in the Forum was unparalleled. The Forum was well organized, and the organizers knew how to draw attention and energize the participants. AKPBS will get assistance from PCIA Partners in assessing product design, carbon finance, municipal waste incineration, and use of LED lights for affordable lighting.
What mentoring or other opportunities have you had to share your successful approaches with others?
Several Partners have expressed interest in community exchange visits in AKPBS’ working areas. They have also informed us that they will try to introduce exchange visits on similar patterns. There is interest in AKPBS’ stove designs from Chinese and African partners and interest in social marketing approaches from partners in Mali. Ugastove has already started exploring opportunities for promoting institutional stoves in collaboration with Aga Khan Development Network in Uganda.
What are your program’s goals for the coming 1-2 years?
AKPBS plans to disseminate 45,000 stoves over the next 3 years and improve stove design. These stoves will be sold by 20 emerging enterprises in the project are as per market demand.