Torre David ~ Skyscraper Squat in Caracas, VE

Thanks to my MIT colleague Caleb Harper for spotlighting Torre David, an abandoned and unfinished 45-story skyscraper in Caracas, Venezuela which has been taken over by 2,500 locals (some 750+ families) who now call it home. While some might be dismayed by the seemingly anarchistic nature of extra-legal squatter invasions and often hazardous conditions of the building, I especially appreciate the emergent, bottom-up solutions and DIY creativity the residents exhibit, building everything from their own private spaces, to shared-use commons and stores, to essential infrastructure and security. In their NYTimes piece and related video Squatters on the Skyline, Simon Romero and Maria Eugenia Diaz write A 45-Story Walkup Beckons the Desperate...

"The office tower, one of Latin America’s tallest skyscrapers, was meant to be an emblem of Venezuela’s entrepreneurial mettle. But that era is gone. Now, with more than 2,500 squatters making it their home, the building symbolizes something else entirely in this city’s center. The squatters live in the uncompleted high-rise, which lacks several basic amenities like an elevator. [...] Once one of Latin America’s most developed cities, Caracas now grapples with an acute housing shortage. [...] Private construction of housing here has virtually ground to a halt because of fears of government expropriation. The government, hobbled by inefficiency, has built little housing of its own for the poor. [But] strivers abound in the skyscraper. They chafe at being called “invaders,” the term here for squatters, preferring the less contentious word “neighbor.” A beauty salon operates on one floor. On another, an unlicensed dentist applies the brightly colored braces that are the rage in Caracas street fashion. Almost every floor has a small bodega. [...] “There’s opportunity in this tower."

Also check out Torre David documentary trailer... Caleb's asking the fascinating question "What if we built such towers intentionally with adequate but affordable infrastructure and amenities?" Addendum: AmusingPlanet's Kaushik revisits Torre David.

Entrepreneurial Solutions ~ Kacou on Prosperity

See here Eric Kacou on Entrepreneurial Solutions for Prosperity in BoP Markets. FYI, he's speaking next on the entrepreneurship panel at MIT Sloan Africa 2.0 Conference Fri 1 April 2011...

Cuba Empresarial ~ Decriminalizing Capitalism...

Victoria Burnett writes in the NYTimes that In a Shift, Cubans Savor Working for Themselves...

"Eagerly, warily, Cubans are taking up the government’s offer to work for themselves, selling coffee in their front yards, renting out houses, making rattan furniture and hawking everything from bootleg DVDs to Silly Bandz and homemade wine. Hoping to resuscitate Cuba’s crippled economy, President Raúl Castro opened the door to a new, if limited, generation of entrepreneurs last year [...] Streets once devoid of commerce in towns like this and in Havana are gradually coming to life as people hang painted signs and bright awnings outside their houses and mount roadside stalls. An electronics engineer, who for years operated in the shadows, now publishes leaflets that claim he can mend every appliance under the sun. A practitioner of Santería sells beaded necklaces, ground sardines and toasted corn used in ceremonies at the tin-roofed shop in her yard. Ms. Álvarez and her husband, Ivan Barroso, took out a license for the cafe and another to sell meat and fish. Now the couple does a brisk business serving soft white rolls filled with garlicky pork and fresh tuna for 60 cents at a wooden counter in the gateway of their house.[...] “If you have the ability, the dedication to achieve something, you should enjoy it,” said Mr. Barroso, who until November sold fish and pork without a license to a close circle of friends and clients."

How exciting is that! Cuba empresarial!

Mobilizing Haiti ~ Safe Banking & Services via Cell

Great to see this Gates effort towards Mobilizing Haiti...

"Eighty percent of Haitians live in poverty, subject to natural and man-made disasters. The catastrophic earthquake of January 2010 threw Haiti's fragile economy into chaos. Now, Haitians living in a cash-based economy are turning to mobile phones for safe banking."

Cubalismo ~ Is Castro Going Capitalist!?

Marc Frank writes in the FT that Cuba unveils a capitalist revolution!

"Cuba has moved to shake up its complacent labour force, with President Raul Castro putting in place the framework for a rudimentary jobs market and a small-business sector. By publishing laws governing layoffs, drastic cuts in unemployment benefits and the development of small businesses, the reform-minded president has taken the biggest steps to date to modernise the economy."

It's a start.

Renaissance Project ~ Hope For Haiti @ MIT...

Good to see Gerthy Lahens, Jan Wampler, and team of the Renaissance Project: Hope For Haiti at MIT making progress on their goals to build:

• Vital, self-sustaining housing and community;
• Local skills and entrepreneurial action;
• Places of learning and housing for Haitian students;
• Sustainable food, water, and energy solutions.

Here's their recent interview on NNN...

Tempohousing Haiti ~ Container Hotel In-Process

One of my favorite urban innovation ventures, the Dutch Tempohousing, just sent word that their factory in China has shipped the promised ~70 prefabricated hotel units of their so-called "King" design (see above two containers side-by-side making 2 wide rooms with central hallway) for imminent delivery to Haiti. This is just one example of fast, urgent solutions desperately needed in that devastated land...

"Once the necessary funds were secured, Tempohousing was able to immediately make available these hotel rooms, that are shipped with all internal furniture and finishes to reduce on site construction as much as possible. The complete hotel is scheduled to be ready in October / November this year. [...] Speed and budget have been key issues in this hotel project, but quality and the delivery of an integrated storm and hurricane proof solution have made Tempohousing the first choice among several global suppliers. The manufacturing facility in China is capable to make layouts and interior finishes exactly to customer wishes with components that meet all international standards. Together with the separate façade system, the end results is simply amazing. An impressive hotel where nobody can see or expect it all started with complete rooms shipped in containers from the Far East."

This is fantastic. Check out the "King" room more closely here...

Walking the Walk ~ PIH Helps Amputees in Haiti

Partners in Health (PIH) salutes recovering Haitian amputees...

"After she lost both her legs in the January earthquake, Carmen was determined not only to walk again, but to help others regain their mobility."

The huge January quake in Haiti crushed many limbs, many which needed to be amputated in order to save the patient. But this has led to great demand for affordable prosthetics, which is one reason I'm a big supporter of MIT's D-Lab Developing World Prosthetics activities!

Krik? Krak! ~ MIT Media Lab Projects for Haiti

My MIT Media Lab colleagues Barry Vercoe and Dale Joachim, together with guest speakers, are organizing a Krik? Krak! Spring 2010 seminar, MAS.963 New Media Projects For Haiti...

"...a project-based class to develop new technologies and educational tools to help revolutionize Haitian society. We will explore viable contexts for promoting self-expression, communication, literacy and numeracy, and digital governance, given the challenges within the society. Topics will include sensors, language, music, computational methods of teaching and learning, civic engagement and social media."

Rapid Shelter Solutions ~ Tempohousing Delivers!

I'm delighted to see that one of my favorite urban ventures -- Tempohousing -- has pulled together a suite of Rapid Shelter Solutions for Haitian-reconstruction (and for recovery-and-regeneration zones, in general), and offers a...

"...fast solution to build new homes for displaced families [...] The system anticipates an extreme short set up time with complete packages shipped from our factory in China. Solid structures that are storm and earthquake proof and provide safe and comfortable shelter at the lowest cost is essential in this stage of helping the victims. [...] What Tempohousing offers is so called 2nd stage support that comes after the first aid with tents, food and medicines. In the 2nd stage the rebuilding of the country has priority. Download the brochure with technical details, pictures and pricing..."

This is a great initiative, and I hope a commercially viable and socially responsible venture! As I wrote about immediately post-quake, Haiti needs a whole family of containerized urgent solutions that are fast, flexible, and scalable.

Business in Haiti ~ Continuing Trade & Tourism

Robert Booth of the Guardian reports Royal Caribbean is committed to continuing cruise ship visits to their private complex in Labadee, Haiti -- a location on the other side of Hispaniola from the Port-au-Prince earthquake zone. Multiple commentators have expressed "horror" at this decision, calling it an "ethics void" among other disparagements, arguing everything from "callous, aloof" to distasteful "business as usual" and "misuse of resources" to "social injustice". The anti-commercial ethically-myopic irrational righteousness of such comments is really quite saddening. What's unethical about this enterprise? Absolutely nothing. Indeed, it took courage on the part of the cruise company to realize that their northern Haitian employees still need jobs and income, that neighboring resorts in the Dominican Republic, Jamaica, and Puerto Rico remain open, that operating and remaining profitable is what allows them to donate millions to relief, and that they can also open their port to relief supplies in addition to cruise customers. They add to what Haiti needs most right now: A combination of immediate aid -- which governments, civic institutions, and aid organizations are pouring in like a tidal wave, deceptively slow to build up, but ultimately huge -- and urgent solutions for systematic rebuilding, and continued longer-term economic development and regeneration. As Booth quotes Royal Caribbean saying...

"In the end, Labadee is critical to Haiti's recovery; hundreds of people rely on Labadee for their livelihood," said John Weis, vice-president. "In our conversations with the UN special envoy of the government of Haiti, Leslie Voltaire, he notes that Haiti will benefit from the revenues that are generated from each call. "We also have tremendous opportunities to use our ships as transport vessels for relief supplies and personnel to Haiti. Simply put, we cannot abandon Haiti now that they need us most." "Friday's call in Labadee went well," said Royal Caribbean. "Everything was open, as usual. The guests were very happy to hear that 100% of the proceeds from the call at Labadee would be donated to the relief effort."

Who else is on-board helping build up Business in Haiti?

Global 911 ~ Better, Faster First Response?

In developed world urban settings with functioning firestations and ambulance services and with emergencies mostly limited in scale, we have high confidence in rapid first response to an alert. Fire trucks, police, and EMT's arriving in timespans measured in minutes is often the difference between life and death. In Port-au-Prince it has now been nearly a week and still the majority of the affected Haitians have not seen aid, those buried alive are no longer being heard from, and treatable critical injuries are largely unaddressed. Those doctors and nurses currently in situ are flat-out totally overwhelmed. The Globe's Maria Sacchetti writes of Saving lives with just the tools at hand: No water, no power as surgical mission starts in on the endless line of need and reports... 60 Minutes Byron Pitts reports from Haiti... Finally, CNN's Cooper and Watson report on "needless, stupid death"... Can we figure out a more effective Global 911 for better, faster first response to international emergencies? I'm impressed with this CNN story about Tad Skylar Agoglia's First Response Team of America and wonder if that's scalable and replicable?

Mountains Beyond Quakes ~ "Whatever It Takes"

Tracy Kidder's eye-opening book Mountains Beyond Mountains is about Paul Farmer and his colleagues at Partners in Health (PIH), the largest healthcare institution still able to operate in post-quake Haiti. Farmer and PIH people including Ophelia Dahl, Jim Kim, and many others have been providing quality care for nearly two decades and have built up a largely local pool of talent. Their mission is to do "Whatever It Takes" using all the means at their disposal to help people become well. The title to Kidder's book refers to a Haitian proverb that "beyond mountains there are more mountains" meaning that after solving one problem, you tackle the next. Beyond this quake, Haitians need many more partners to help them deploy urgent solutions and maximize progress towards rebuilding Haiti and a more prosperous future.

Urgent Solutions ~ Fast, Flexible, Scalable, Now

I've written before about the usefulness of containerized infrastructure and floating infrastructure -- e.g. hospital ships, power generation barges, containerized health clinics, and more. Devastation in post-quake Port-au-Prince -- and, btw, in other disaster-struck or war-ravaged recovery zones -- demands that we invest heavily in ramping up and deploying many more of these urgent solutions, certainly as an essential part of rebuilding Haiti properly. Here's further examples of fast, flexible, scalable, and re-deployable container-systems which are all needed now. First of all, water desalination and purification, for instance this HOH-USA unit... Next, wastewater treatment systems such as this Ozzi Clean unit...And modular electricity generation units, such as this HAASE Combined Heat & Power system... And, of course, flexible fuel (e.g. LPG) and clean water storage mechanisms such as these containerized tanks by Chassis King... Finally, one of my favorites, Tempohousing living spaces...

Rebuilding Haiti ~ Let's Finally Do It Right, Yes?

Major quakes -- or tsunamis, or typhoons, or other devastations -- will be disastrously damaging, regardless. But for people dwelling in poor constructions, lacking emergency support systems, and living in impoverished circumstances, it's totally catastrophic. Cataclysmic, really. Beyond emergency aid -- which thankfully is pouring in from goodwill globally -- let us set the stage for Rebuilding Haiti -- and doing it right, yes? Not just rebuilding the destroyed Port-au-Prince metro-area, but all countrywide. This means...

• Rapid Solutions ~ Prioritizing essentials -- and emphasizing support for those with responsive capacity -- including fast-action as only the military can, plus modular, rapid-deploy solutions;
• Emergency Response Systems ~ Immediate medical response by bolstering established institutions such as Partners In Health / Zanmi Lasante, sending hospital ships such as the USNS Comfort, transhipping rapidly deployable clinics, and generally deploying rugged sustainable solutions;
  
• Rallying the Haitian Diaspora ~ Support my MIT colleague Rebecca Roseme Obounou and her CHES team, especially emphasizing entrepreneurship, creativity, and commerce;
• Proper Infrastructure ~ Invest in and build up Power & Electricity, Water, Sanitation, Roadways, Ports, ICT, Mobiles, and more;
  
• Enforcing Building Codes ~ Too much of the death and injury was avoidable if only available materials were combined in minimally technically acceptable ways. Let's believe in reality & results, not faith & hope;
  
• Quake & Typhoon Resistant Structures ~ Let's make structures in a way savvy to the forces ravaging the region, including containerized fast-builds and sustainable villages;
  
• Reforestation ~ Can we reverse the devastating deforestation that makes Haiti disproportionately susceptible to floods, landslides, and worse? Let's build on the ethos of Kenyan Nobelist Wangari Maathai and her Green Belt Movement;
  
• Sustainable Solutions ~ Including renewable energy systems such as various Development Ventures, including especially those offered by MIT $100K Entrepreneurship Competition D-Track Winner Bagazo;
• Economic Regeneration ~ Haiti was once one of the wealthiest places in the Western Hemisphere. Let us all help her peoples recover that greatness and regenerate their economy and ecology of the island and all her children.

These are all achievable, compelling, and essential goals. Let's get busy rebuilding Haiti now.

Pioneers of Prosperity ~ The Caribbean Cadre!

Thanks to Nick Buckley -- one of our MIT Development Ventures class alums who cross-registered from the Harvard Kennedy School -- for pointing at this wonderful batch of videos showcasing the Caribbean Pioneers of Prosperity 2009. These winners are a diverse set of entrepreneurs and each are great role models for entrepreneurship both in their countries and the region. The Bulkan Timber Works won the $100K Grand Prize, both the Alternative Insurance Company (AIC) and Totally Male Ltd won $75K each, and the rest won $40K each. It took Nick and his colleagues six months to hone in on the finalists from an initial applicant pool of nearly 600. Here's just one story, that of the Alternative Insurance Company...