Last year's devastating quake in Haiti created a pressing need for new, durable housing structures. Photo: Cassandra Nelson/Mercy Corps.

Part of a Global Envision miniseries about Portland State University's effort to become the "Consumer Reports" of developing-world technology. Read the introduction.

With the specter of Haiti’s hurricane season looming, everyone involved in the 1000 Homes for Haiti project wanted to get the sustainable, earthquake-proof shelters to the island nation as soon as possible.

But there was a catch: when the houses got wet, they leaked.

The story begins with Charles Fox of Portland’s Pacific Green Innovations (PGI), who came up with the idea for the project after a trip to Haiti in 2010, when he recognized the country’s need for low-cost, sustainable and permanent housing, according to the Portland Tribune. “If you give someone a transitional house, it becomes permanent,” he told the paper. As of August, more than 600,000 Haitians were still living in makeshift housing and tent camps, according to The Christian Science Monitor.

PGI bought building panels of resin-soaked recycled paper from a German building-material manufacturer called SwissCell, which PGI's website bills as earthquake-resistant, fire resistant, weather and temperature resistant.

In June 2010, PSU students actually assembled one of PGI's model homes in a campus park. This was partially to demonstrate another of the homes’ aspects that made it seem perfect for Haiti and the developing world in general: the building panels are modular and can be assembled quickly and simply. PGI says all of the houses’ materials can be produced in Haiti by Haitians.

Things went swimmingly until a curious detail caught the eye of a PSU researcher: the home had water damage. If sitting outside in Portland made the house leak, how would it hold up amid Haitian squalls, humidity and hurricanes? To test it, they tossed some of the panels into PSU’s state-of-the-art Thermotron, a device that, according to Senior Fellow Sergio Palleroni of PSU’s Institute for Sustainable Solutions, "can create any environment on earth, any weather condition." They cranked up the heat and humidity to Haitian summertime levels, and let the panels stew for a couple of weeks.

The results confirmed their initial suspicions: Palleroni says that on average, the material lost 60 percent of its structural capacity to resist breakage. In high-wind, high-humidity conditions, the houses could actually fall apart. And for a Caribbean country far more prone to hurricanes than earthquakes—there were four in 2008 alone, according to The Guardian—that’s a big problem.

PGI stands by their product despite Palleroni's criticism. PGI’s manufacturer, Magnum Building Products, wrote in an email to Global Envision that PSU's testing may not have been reliable.

"When installed properly and finished per the guidelines also found on our website, Magnum Board structures will be in use far longer than most any other building product on the market today,” wrote Daniel Armstrong. His full response can be found below, in the comments section.

PSU researchers don’t say the houses have no use, but they don’t think they are a good permanent solution for Haiti. Palleroni pointed out that while the building materials may have passed the manufacturer’s test, they were tested as separate components; the problems showed up when they were fully assembled. PGI disagrees, with its manufacturer arguing that PSU made “no distinction as to what elements of the assembly were the primary contributor(s)" to the homes' failure.” PGI has already implemented their housing program in Haiti.

While there’s no consensus over the houses’ suitability for Haiti’s climate, the fact that there’s a debate at all is unusual. Intensive testing like the kind done at PSU is not often performed on products for the developing world. All too often, potential design problems aren’t identified until after a product is in use. Sending flawed products abroad wastes money and other resources, and in some cases the products might even hurt those that they are intended to help. Improved technologies and testing procedures allow for a longer revision period and result in better products that do more for people in need. And since that’s really the goal of humanitarian design, hopefully intensive product testing will become the norm.

Margo Conner is a senior at Lewis & Clark College in Portland, Oregon, majoring in international affairs. Read her other contributions to Global Envision.

Cellphones are transforming the way in which aid workers are tackling the transmission of infectious diseases in Haiti. Photo:ambafranceht (flickr)

In Haiti, aid workers may have saved thousands of lives by tracking the cell phones of displaced citizens.

Following the 2010 earthquake (which claimed the lives of over 200,000), and a deadly cholera outbreak that originated in a U.N refugee camp, public health researchers in the area discovered that they could harness Haiti’s burgeoning cell phone network in a unique way.

Researchers found that not only was it possible to anonymously track (via cellphone SIM cards) the movements of displaced citizens, but that in doing so they could also anticipate the spread of epidemics, NPR reports. This let aid and health workers reach areas of infection more efficiently, curbing the further spread and transmission of disease.

An additional benefit to utilizing the Haitian cell network was that medical workers were able to distribute health advice by way of text and voicemail messages to thousands of Haitians, tips on everything from re-hydration to breastfeeding infected babies.

Though this effort was one of the first of its kind, infectious disease investigators believe that similar techniques for future outbreaks around the globe have the potential to be equally effective. Add "epidemic control" to the consistently growing list of uses for mobile phones. At the pace that cellular and smart phone technology are developing, who knows what’s next?

Haitians load bags of food donated by the United States onto a truck for distribution to earthquake victims in Port-au-Prince after the January earthquake. Photo: Jenny Vaughan/Mercy Corps

In Haiti, rice is king. It’s consumed at every meal and forms an important source of income for many people — wholesalers, street vendors, and farmers. But the January earthquake has left the rice market in shambles.

Cheap rice from the United States made up about 80 percent of all rice in Haiti before the earthquake. But Haiti’s ports were damaged by the earthquake and could only receive a fraction of the shipments they used to. Shipments of military and humanitarian supplies were prioritized above commercial shipments of rice, which led to rice shortages and huge price increases that many people couldn’t afford.

Foreign aid flowed in to make up the difference, but this has long-term consequences for Haiti's food supply chain, says NPR. Most people get their rice from street vendors, who get theirs from mini-wholesalers. These wholesalers buy from larger wholesalers, who buy imported rice. But the influx of donated rice means that many people have flat-out stopped buying rice.

The situation has become especially dire for the street vendors and mini-wholesalers. The large wholesalers have access to credit to help them survive the crisis, but small businesses aren’t so lucky, as NPR and Frontline explain in this video.

As commercial rice imports start to flow back into Haiti and supply increases, rice has become cheaper than it was before the earthquake. The plunge in prices is forcing rural farmers to choose between eating the rice that they grow and selling it to pay school fees for their children. To make matters worse, the rice-growing regions are largely outside the earthquake zone, where foreign food aid isn't being distributed. As a result, many farmers are going hungry to send their kids to school.

So what are aid groups doing to solve the free rice problem? Now that the rice supply is beginning to stabilize, the World Food Programme has begun distributing cash or vouchers that can be redeemed for rice. In the Frontline video, WFP analyst Ceren Gurken said that the voucher program was in the works; it has been implemented since the video was filmed. Because the WFP pays street vendors for the rice, who pay that money back up the supply chain, the economy gets a chance to recover. At present, it doesn't look like farmers are being included in the program, though that may change.

Sure, the vouchers have their downsides — hand out too many and demand spikes, bringing sky-high prices — but for now, they’re the best way for aid groups to make sure that Haiti’s food supply chain stays connected. If it breaks, there could be a whole new disaster.