Clay housing reduces cost: Expert

By LUKE KAMA
INTRODUCING clay houses to Papua New Guinea will be a “one-stop shop” solution that will significantly address the high cost of rentals and accommodation as well as other social issues, an expert says.
Johannes Kaman, who specialises in natural resource economics and had been working in various countries around the world, told The National on Friday that the Government needed to tap into clay housing.
“Introducing clay housing in PNG will have a significant impact on the housing and real estate industry by reducing the cost of accommodation and rentals in Port Moresby and the country,” he said.
Kaman said a feasibility study on clay housing in Port Moresby and the country was done in 2014 and the outcome was overwhelmingly positive but a lack of political support had stalled the idea from taking off.
“I did the feasibility study in 2014 and the findings were that it (clay housing) would be a ‘one-stop shop’ for housing and accommodations needs in the country,” he said.
“The cost of building and owning a clay house will be reduced significantly and that should then lower rental and accommodations costs.
“The cost of building clay houses is low.
“At the same time, you will eradicate all these counterfeit building material flooding into the country by using the abundance of clay available in the country.”
Kaman said the latest structure built from clay was a 14-storey building in Thailand.
“You can smash bricks using certain amount of force but you cannot smash a clay brick (brick produced from clay) using that same amount of force. It’s very strong and you can use the clay to build your house starting from the floor up to the wall and the roofing.”
Kaman said building a four-bed room clay house would cost around K50-K60,000 while building it using the regular building materials produced from wood and metal had a K400,000 to K500,000 price tag.