Awra Amba RJ 300612 EN - Contacter un comité local d'Attac

Awra Amba, a current experiment of utopian socialism
construction site. Beams, rafters and centre poles are hewn or cut from trees by the men. Branches of
trees are collected and cut to desired lengths for wattles as the work progresses. Both men and
women carry water for making the mixture of mud and manure, which is daubed on the wattles by
both also (At05/38).
Picture 12: Village houses; Stove and furniture specific to the community.
Household furniture and fixtures include a bed with mosquito net, chairs made of frames of boughs
of trees crossed with strips of leather, made at home. Most houses have a leather bench built into the
wall for use in sitting and sleeping (At05/37; Ya08/89). They are equipped with a stove and similar
furniture in all houses (see Picture 12), and often with a private weaving machine. The stove is a
closed model specific to the village, designed by Zumra in 1979. It is raised off the ground to prevent
young children being burnt accidentally and has a chimney, which evacuates the smoke (this is not
always the case in Ethiopia). The chimney has a bend in it, on which water can be boiled, and which
also enables it to be cleaned. Energy consumption for cooking is half as high as elsewhere according
to the German cooperation (GTZ). Each house is also equipped with a kitchen dresser made of wood
and mud (Mamo, 2006; Jo10b/8).
Houses and furniture are built from the same material as every African village has: mud. The
difference is that they are built attractively, while bearing energy saving in mind, and also the need
for furniture which can be made of the same mud, not limiting the design to just the basic roof and
walls (Bat-Gil, 2009).
Each household has a Turkish toilet on a cesspool. These toilets are grouped together, and are located
50-100 meters outside the village (Jo10b/8). The village has some rubbish containers, which is most
unusual in Ethiopia, in which the rubbish is burnt outside the village. Unlike the neighbouring
villages, the houses and the village are very clean, which limits the infectious diseases like malaria
(Ya08/89). The maintenance is done by all inhabitants of the village, under the control of the
sanitation committee of the cooperative (Crespo, 2012).
Water is available at four taps; it is not clear if it is suitable for drinking or not (Crespo, 2011; 2012)
(Question 27 in Annex). It is free at the old manual pump, whose well has been initially dug by the
community and then deepened with the help of Finland (Awraamba, nd; Yi07/44), and has to be paid
for at the taps installed by the State and connected to a diesel pump (Jo10b/9). The community had in
January 2011 the project, uncompleted in 2012, to install a system for sewage disposal (Crespo,
2011; 2012).
The village has electricity. The grain mill operates partly on electricity and each house of the village
has a light bulb to light; each family paid in 2011 1 birr the corresponding annual consumption, and
more if it thought to have more consumed (Crespo, 2011); in 2012, each household is equipped with
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