Building Collapse in Nigeria: The Causes, Effects, Consequences and Remedies (Published)
Building collapses in Nigeria have been on the increase in recent times. There are frequent media reports of collapsed of buildings in major Nigerian cities like Lagos, Abuja, and Port Harcourt, etc and other parts of the world. In an attempt to find lasting solutions to tackle the challenges, this paper examines causes of building collapse in Nigeria and also enumerated specific areas the stakeholders in the building industry and the general public are affected. The problems range from faulty design, negligence, incompetence, faulty construction, foundation failures, extraordinary loads and corruption. Forces of nature were also identified as part of causes of building collapse. Some recommendations were made as part of lasting solutions to tackle the challenges.
Keywords: Building Industry, Building collapse, Extraordinary loads, Faulty design, lasting Solution.
The Building Industry in the Housing Programme: Technology, Materials and Labour Towards Adressing Housing Shortage in Nigeria (Published)
The building industry is a sector of national economy engaged in preparation of land and construction, alteration, and repair of buildings, structures, and other real property. More agents, institutions and intermediaries have become involved in the various stages of housing construction as a means of producing more housing for human shelter. Building Industry work involves the construction of a new or existing commercial, industrial or domestic buildings or structure. The major form of urban land use is housing construction, and also the pattern of urban land use largely determines the pattern of urban growth and development. (Agbola, 2002). However, this paper examined the essential link between the building industry, technology, materials and labour in relations to housing programme. And its goal is to critically examine the roles of building industry in the housing programme since housing programme as immensely contributed to the development of building construction industry in Nigeria. The paper shows some of the functions of building industry in housing programme, the materials to be use , technology employed and the labour used in the construction process and highlights the need for government to encourage both the private and public building industry to provide quality and affordable housing for human consumption as this will be part of the housing programme organized to alleviate the problem of inadequate housing in most developing countries.
Keywords: Building Industry, Housing Programme, Housing Shortage, Labour, Materials, Technology
