Focus on: the Tunkhel Village in Mongolia

Every week, the CoHabitat Network introduces you to a collaborative housing project documented on the cohabitat.io database.

Mongolia is a country of fiercely independent people with a long history of surviving on their own as nomadic herders. But as the country urbanises, people living in towns and cities are searching for more neighbourly and more collective ways to solve their serious problems of poverty and housing.

In Tunkhel, a community committee formed and prepared its own housing project proposal. With some help, people made the layout plans, drafted the budget and laid out a work plan, with clear roles for various partners.

Community members carried out the construction work themselves, as a collective process. The Tunkhel Village savings group committee and local government made a contract with the ten community members to finance the house construction, and then checked the progress and assisted the building process.

The finished project showed a new way and brought about some big changes in the community. Relations between neighbours are now warmer, communication is easier, drinking problems have diminished and confidence has grown.

The saving groups and local government continue their collaboration with projects to boost women's employment, set up elderly social groups, tackle health care problems, and boost employment and livelihood possibilities.

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