Widespread failure to comply with the Barbados National Building Code is putting lives at risk, a senior standards official warned on Friday.
Senior Technical Officer with the Barbados National Standards Institution (BNSI), Jonathan Platt delivered the stark message during a World Town Planning Day webinar, highlighting that “a significant portion of disaster damage in Barbados and the Caribbean is in the housing sector” and stressing the importance of properly constructing houses.
“Now, imagine this, the total economic cost of disasters in the Caribbean exceeded $28 billion over the last seven decades. That’s between the periods of 1950 and 2022,” Platt told the Barbados Town Planning Society-hosted webinar themed Complete Communities: Reimagining Settlement, Communities and Housing Solutions.
“We’ve seen Hurricane Maria in 2017, $1.3 billion in damages and losses in Dominica alone. Hurricane Dorian in 2019, $3.2 billion in damages and losses in The Bahamas and the La Soufrière eruption in 2021, $233 million in damages and losses in St Vincent and the Grenadines. Then the earthquake in Haiti, $1.6 billion in damages and losses and more than 137 000 buildings were damaged and destroyed.”
Pointing out how many lives were lost over the years during the passing of weather events, Platt said not sticking to building codes puts human life at risk.
“Over 25 000 people were killed in disasters in the Caribbean between 1950 and 2022. In Haiti alone in 2021, there were 2 246 deaths, over 329 people were missing and over 660 000 people were impacted. Now just project those figures to us locally in Barbados, a population of 280 000 since July 1. If this impacted Barbados, we would only have a population of 32 000; we would not be able to cope,” Platt said.
“So you can clearly see that a significant portion of disaster damage in the Caribbean is the housing sector…. The inconsistent application of building codes and the possible weak legislation have contributed to the extensive damage that we’re seeing around in our region.”
The BNSI officer strongly cautioned against hiring cheap labour in construction, noting that many properties “look good” whilst failing to meet essential safety standards.
He said: “This may be where some of the issues could be resolved. We all see this kind of construction so many times. Many houses built through the informal construction sector do not adhere to the formal building codes and standards. Many persons go and borrow money from financial institutions and then they look for ways to make that money last as long as it possibly can. In other words, they look to their relatives, their friends who say ‘look, I know somebody that can build, he’s a friend of mine; he did it quite well for me’,
“But you do not know his method of construction. You do not know if he has been building wrong all the time but it looks good, but the latent defect is still there. Has he tied down the roof? Has he put the steel in after he’s built the blocks? You do not know and these are things that can have a serious impact on the resilience and sustainability of your property.”
To address these concerns, Platt called for the integration of the Barbados National Building Code into teaching curricula and the implementation of a certification system to verify compliance during the building phase.
sheriabrathwaite@barbadostoday.bb
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