CORE RELIEF
Useful information
- Team members
- LATRA Aris Papadopoulos Evi Pappa
- Country
- Greece
- Keywords
- Humanitarian aid universal design open source 3D printing participatory innovation circular production equitable development refugees recycling
Short Description
Universal 3D printed open source humanitarian products manufactured by refugees in a camp in Lesvos
Detailed Description
CORE RELIEF are 3D printed humanitarian products designed by refugees inside a camp in Lesvos, by recycling 13 universal aid products distributed by all humanitarian agencies (eg UNHCR) in every emergency across the world to protect 65 million people from war and famine. Products include a smart link converting refugee shelters into furniture, umbilical clips protecting babies from infection and a kit for disinfecting and saving water. CORE RELIEF is:
-Valuable: By using 3D printing to recycle discarded aid into new products, the project is fully circular, decreasing the cost of humanitarian aid and environmental waste
-Distributable: Users can produce products on-demand by downloading open source designs and utilising local materials and technology
-Reproducible: Since the products are modifications of globally used humanitarian aid and designs are open source, the products are produced across the world
-Design Sensitive as the users control all aesthetic elements of the product
Project Details
- Does your design take social and cultural challenges and human wellbeing into consideration?
CORE RELIEF addresses 4 key challenges:
1) The reliance of refugee and displaced communities in humanitarian aid distributed in order to survive, prosper and support their well-being.
2) The lack of empowerment of refugees and displaced communities to become drivers of change and build communities which are resilient and sustainable
3) The high cost and low design life cycle of the standardised plastic humanitarian products distributed across the world, leading to environmental waste, non-manageable pollution and unhealthy habitats.
4) The lack of cooperation in the humanitarian sector, to produce open source solutions that can be shared between actors across the world enabling them to work towards inflicting systemic change across shared challenges.CORE RELIEF addresses these challenges by:
1) Empowering refugees with technological means, knowledge, information and access to a world-wide community of innovation that enables them to produce on-site and on-demand products that they need.
2) Following a process of open and inclusive design and production that enables refugees to becoming drivers in the process of building communities which are resilient and sustainable.
3) Using a range of accessible technologies to produce open source products which are based on recycling strategies of universally distributed humanitarian aid. This has the dual benefit of utilising local resources since these products are universally distributed, as well as leading to a reduction of the waste caused after they reach the end of their design life cycle.
4) Producing open source designs and sharing these openly and free with relevant stakeholders across the world
- Does your design support sustainable production, embodying circular or regenerative design practices?
CORE RELIEF products, are a sustainable answer to the financial, material and environmental waste produced by the discarded plastic humanitarian aid products (tents, blankets, jerry cans, tarpaulins, buckets) which are universally distributed in every emergency and environmental disaster around the world, by all major humanitarian agencies (UNHCR, UNICEF, MSF, IFRC). As there are currently 65 million refugees and internally displaced people around the world, the scale of distribution of these products is unprecedented. From Yemen to Syria and Congo to Ethiopia, there is not a place in the world that has experienced a crisis where these items are not distributed. In Greece alone, UNHCR distributes 50.000 items every month, helping refugees to restructure their communities. The intense use, means that these aid products very quickly become obsolete, and in need of constant replacement. The lack of an effective recycling strategy, results in expensive life-saving products expiring quickly, increasing the cost of humanitarian aid and leading into great amounts of non-sustainable environmental waste.
CORE RELIEF responds to these challenges by:
1) Producing open source designs which make use of the discarded humanitarian products which are available across the world through global distribution and local resources and technologies to manufacture new products.
2) Lowering the cost of humanitarian aid products and environmental waste produced as it makes use of a circular design and manufacturing process that recycles and repurposes discarded plastic aid products.
3) Enabling critical field needs at the forefront of humanitarian and environmental disasters to be met on the spot and on demand, by enabling local and circular design and production.
- Does your design use principles of distribution and open source?
CORE RELIEF products are distributed free and open source to humanitarian agencies distributing aid items, companies producing humanitarian products and fab labs across the world that are working directly or indirectly with issues of war, famine and environmental displacement. The objective is not to profit by the development of designs, but rather to have a wide-reaching positive impact as possible, by empowering all relevant stakeholders to unite behind a sustainable cause aimed at improving the wellbeing of people affected by displacement. In order to have global impact, the project takes advantage of the worldwide distribution and universality of these products by ‘hacking’ their design using emergent technologies and local craft, to produce new products that the communities need.
- Does your design promote awareness of responsible design and consumption?
CORE RELIEF products are distributed free and open source to humanitarian agencies distributing aid items, companies producing humanitarian products and fab labs across the world that are working directly or indirectly with issues of war, famine and environmental displacement. The objective is not to profit by the development of designs, but rather to have a wide-reaching positive impact as possible, by empowering all relevant stakeholders to unite behind a sustainable cause aimed at improving the wellbeing of people affected by displacement. In order to have global impact, the project takes advantage of the worldwide distribution and universality of these products by ‘hacking’ their design using emergent technologies and local craft, to produce new products that the communities need.
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