Bamboo-based house construction is very common in North East India especially in the villages and the Debbarma community of West Tripura District is no exceptions to this. These types of houses are constructed with local and renewable materials and are more sustainable and resilient. On an average, a normal bamboo house lasts for 10-12 years and then it needs repair or replacement.

Jana Unnayan Samiti Tripura (JUST), a FARM Northeast partner of Caritas India with Forest Research Centre for Livelihood Extension (FRCLE), Agartala has trained community people on bamboo treatment through scientific methods for house construction.

The treatment enhances the durability of the bamboo and keeps it stronger for at least 70-80 years that too without any maintenance. The treated bamboo remains free of any pest attacks especially termites. Such houses are also earthquake resilient. The community members were given the opportunity to interact with the experts and get hands-on demonstration for treatment of bamboos.

The people were trained to treat fresh and matured bamboos with chemicals like Chromated Copper Arsenate (CCA), Copper chrome Boron (CCB) or Borax- Boric Acid, depending on the species or quality of bamboo. Processes like Sap displacement, Boucherie process, Diffusion process, and Empty cell process or Vacuum Pressure Impregnation (VPI) increases the resistance and durability of the bamboo.

“We never thought that bamboo could also be made more useful this way”, expressed Mr. Kanta Debbarma, a Farmer’s Club member after coming out of the training. A locally manufactured machine was used to process bamboos with the technical support from FRCLE. This treatment ensures the durability of the bamboo to a much higher period than the usual untreated ones. 34 individuals from 3 project villages were trained between September 2017 to December 2018 with hands-on support by FRCLE experts.

4 individual members of the community from 2 villages have already started the construction of their houses with treated bamboo. The treatment machine was acquired by them through FRCLE free of cost. Out of the 4 under construction houses, 2 are completed and it is expected that the rest would be complete by March 2019.

JUST plans to take this process forward and reach out to the people of all 15 FARM Northeast villages. JUST is also working on bringing about community action in such activities by motivating people to help each other as a community.