Construction
Supervision
Construction started on site at the end of March 2008 when Jim Smith of Brass Tacks arrived from the UK to oversee the early stages of the project. We hired local workers to carry out the various construction tasks under the supervision of Jim. It is our hope and prayer that these workers will gain the skills to carry on the the job when Brass Tacks are no longer with us. Once our project is complete, these men will have gained a skill that they can use elsewhere to make a living.
Building Materials
The majority of our building materials are purchased locally. Cement is purchased direct from the factory in Ndola and building sand is dug from a pit that we have licensed locally. Building stone is supplied by firms that crush stone excavated from local copper mines and a local business man supplies us concrete sand from a local quarry in a 30 year old Mercedes truck.
Concrete blocks are made by a firm just along the road from the site. In the early days of construction, when the World Cup stadiums were being constructed in South Africa and cement was in short supply here, we are able to supply the firm with cement to make our blocks and get a bigger discount on the price.
Soft wood timber is even grown locally and cut down by the local saw mills under licence to the forestry department, ZAFFICO. These forests are being replanted by seedlings grown from the pine cones harvested from these adult trees.
Galvanised roofing sheets have been supplied from the UK as they are of far better quality to the ones available locally.
Electrical and plumbing supplies have also been sourced in the UK for the same reason, however we will be looking to purchase underground pipes and solar water heating equipment in Zambia.
Machinery
We are pleased that Brass Tacks had two brand new cement mixers in Zambia now and we are able to use one of them on the project. The old Benford mixer that they have run for over 10 years was pensioned off to us in 2010, we bought a new engine for it, and it has been serving us well. We were also using a generator to power the water pump, grinder and other power tools until we got power from ZESCO.
A mechanical digger has been donated by friends in Northern Ireland for use on projects under the care of Mission Support Zambia. Ever since it arrived in 2010, it has been put to very good use here and on various other projects.
Transportation
We are grateful to our partners in Mission Support Zambia for kind assistance in transporting many of our materials from local suppliers as they don’t often offer this service themselves. Sunnybrook Christian Trust (the CMML - Liebenzell partnership running Amano Christian School) and Musenga Mission have also been helpful in transportation of many loads of building sand from the local pit to our project.