Meet Apollo Buregyeya: The Visionary Behind Uganda’s Leading Sustainable Construction Company Eco Concrete Limited
In this conversation, Apollo Buregyeya talks about the areas where Eco Concrete is focused on, he talks about how and why he founded Eco Concrete.
Apollo Buregyeya further shares how his company is revolutionizing Uganda’s infrastructure, developing climate-resilient rural homesteads, and leading the charge for eco-friendly construction across the region.
After being asked about sustainability in the construction sector in Uganda, Apollo Buregyeya said “If you compare Europe and Africa, when somebody is putting up a house in Europe, 60-70% of the cost is in labour and 30-40% is in materials. When you are putting up a house in Uganda, apparently 70-80% of the cost is materials, and labour is very cheap. And so, we initially said, let us revolutionise that by cutting the meat into pieces and discover where the problem is. We independently focus on materials and labour, and by doing that, we communicate well with our clients, reduce the amount of risk, and we are able to deliver cheaper infrastructure.
Sustainability begins from the baseline of accessibility. If I cannot access a house, I cannot start talking about how sustainable my infrastructure is going to be. Also, when we break down these components, we find that labour and materials are locally sourced. So we start looking at local, low-carbon, and affordable materials, which when integrated with our approaches in construction, we tend to be very competitive in the market”.