A timber shortage has slowed up a Red Cross project to build shelters for Indonesian survivors of the Asian tsunami.
The housing effort is designed to provide shelter for 60,000 people in Aceh province but so far only 800 have been housed because of a lack of wood which meets Red Cross environmental standards, according to the province’s Reconstruction and Rehabilitation Agency (BRR).
The BRR has banned use of wood logged in Aceh for environmental reasons, so timber has been imported from other countries, including Canada and New Zealand, to help with reconstruction.
Two rounds of international tendering by the Red Cross failed to find an acceptable supplier. The organisation now hopes a UK-based timber agent can provide 10,000-35,000m3 of Canadian wood for the project.
