"The current crisis has opened our eyes. We need to look for local solutions to solve global problems, promoting architecture that involves local workers, offering local techniques and materials, and empowering people," says Francis Kéré.

In resonance with these few words from the Burkinabé architect, the project aims to bring people together, proposing new agricultural approaches and, above all, emphasizing the improvement of traditional and family farming techniques. In many African countries, agriculture has remained subsistence farming. The project is illustrated through a simulation of a situation that draws its essence from the daily lives of African populations, particularly those in West and Central Africa. It is a village made up of 14 units of huts gathered around a central structure and linked together by common utility spaces.

The strength of the project lies in its universal character. Indeed, it proposes a village model that could be integrated into all regions of Central and West Africa, significantly increasing the productivity and autonomy of the most remote peoples of African countries. The project starts from our deep cultural roots and draws on all that is done as good practice in the agricultural field (cultivation techniques, techniques for preserving food from production). It is surrounded by arable land in order to produce all the food necessary for its operation. Thus the project brings together in its midst:

• Water storage spaces (underground tanks)
• Spaces for the distribution and conservation of agricultural products (food crops)
• Energy production system (solar panels), recovery, and treatment of rainwater (natural filter made of carbon, sand, and gravel).

The project makes use of materials that are available in the different rural areas where it could be implemented. Thus we have:

• Rotain's fiber
• Beaten earth
• Straw
• Bamboo

Project facts

Status: Competition

Project name: "Africa finds itself: Back to the village".

Agency: Nandhaa 

Principal architect: Gake Dela

Associates: Adom Bikliwé, Modeste Awoussi, Lafrique Nobodem

Location: Cameroon

Year of design term: 2015

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