A combination of climate and geographic location expose Uganda to a wide array of natural disasters such as: droughts, famine, epidemics, diseases, floods, land-slides, hail storms, crop pests / diseases, and earthquakes. In addition, man-made disasters are prevalent, such as: conflict, wars and internal displacement, fires, transport accidents, and environmental degradation. The combination of these challenges prove to be detrimental in regards to the millions of people residing in Uganda. Many adjacent countries also are facing current conflicts; people from South Sudan, Rwanda, Tanzania, Kenya, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, are forced to flee, many finding refuge in Uganda. Uganda, a country that faces internal issues of its own, now faces dire need for temporary and permanent housing for both its refugees and citizens.

The Ugandan housing crisis has rapidly expanded with rises in both host and refugee populations. This has created a challenge to provide low-cost and quickly constructed houses. Both the Primitive Hut and Modular constructions have features that can provide insight to this issue. The Primitive Hut is a simplistic structure that utilizes repetitive elements. Modular construction does so as well, yet on a different scale. The task then could be to provide a synthesis of these two constructions, with the local materials available.

Adequate shelter, an essential component to wellbeing, is guaranteed to refugees through the UNHCR’s protection mission.  The agency provide tents, plastic sheeting, and tools, which often include nails and rope.  It is then typically the responsibility of the asylum seeking individuals or families to build and sustain the shelter in which they reside, until other accommodations can be made.

The experiences of fear, trauma, loss, depleted social structures, and relocation that refugees face during the conflicts from are challenges that continue to have an impact for years after resettlement. The journey to resettlement camps are often long and hazardous, and the resettlement process is often a strenuous process. In addition to these pre-existing factors, most refugees settle within camps where they experience overcrowding, lack of amenities, racism, low quality housing, and little sense of community. These living conditions have significant effects on the mental health of the residents living there, often contributing or amplifying common diagnoses.

Refugees are accustomed to insufficient or subsistent levels of existence in regards to various essentials like food, water, and shelter. Oftentimes, these services are dependent on delivery and a traditional model of delivery. The inability to live independent of organizational influences is a major challenge that prevents refugees from experiencing a smooth transition into a new country. The dependency such organizations exists because of conditions that do not empower refugees with the methods of gaining shelter and food independently in new settings. Some organizations provide trainings to refugees, such as the Danish refugee Council (DRC,) which offers training for multiple methods, including vocational, financial, life and protective training. If methods of construction and agriculture were offered or incorporated into training, refugees would be able to build homes that produce food and therefore build independent communities that are self-sustainable.

The most exercised and famous system currently practiced in Western culture is the grid. The grid is a framework of spaces guided by parallel and perpendicular crossings. A less systematic design prominent in other cultures is the practice of the non-conforming, otherwise known as free-form which is encouraged by tradition and culture. Refugee housing that are built follow the grid system pose as being efficient to refugees. This system is desired by individuals who create them but not necessarily by those who will be living in them. Refugees settling in Uganda come from the free-form system and feel their displacement further in these housing systems. Although both systems have their respected pros and cons, a conformity of the pros for both would establish an effective housing prototype for refugees. The configuration that can achieve this is biomimicry is a design based off of the intrinsic logic of nature.

In 2002, the majority of the world’s governments agreed “to achieve by 2010 a significant reduction of the current rate of biodiversity loss at the global, regional and national level…to benefit all life on Earth” has not been met.  Meaning, biodiversity is a growing problem, and the governments of the world are not doing their part to change this growing problem.  A parallel problem is the 65.3 million people that have been forcibly displaced worldwide, and the fact that only 107,100 of those people have been resettled.  That means that about .16% of this problem has been solved.  Due to the lack of solutions that have been found for these problems separately, it is possible that these two issues may need to learn from one another.

Studies show that, on average, each US citizen is responsible for generating 7.1 pounds of waste per day. In 2013, Americans produced 254 million tons of trash. Only about 87 million tons of this material was recycled or composted. This creates a national diversion rate of 34%. The EPA recommends source reduction, which aims to eliminate extraneous materials such as packaging, recycling, and composting as primary objectives to counter this issue. As some cities in the US struggle to reach this average, others have pioneered innovative and effective methods to deal with waste.

Eliminating extraneous hardware, materials and cost has a lot of potential in the search for a cheaper and more comprehensive solution towards refugee housing. Throughout history, cultures have innovated these methods through traditional styles. New Technology has also contributed techniques, reflecting back to times before mass production of hardware.