Soon you could buy eco-friendly Indonesian bamboo houses in Oman

Muscat: Residents can now live in a modern house made completely of bamboo as an alternate to conventional concrete houses, thanks to an Indonesian firm that plans to market it in Oman.
PT Saesha Global Trading, in partnership with an Omani firm called The Enchanted Garden, is bringing this eco-friendly experience to the Sultanate to promote healthy living and nature friendly practices.
This is in contrast with conventional houses that emit harmful gases during construction and their lifetime.
“We asked ourselves why do we go to resorts. It is to relax in the arms of nature. So our next step was how do we bring this experience home. What if our homes were spots, where we can relax the same way. That is what homes are for. With this concept, we brought up the concept of bamboo houses,” Shradha Rungta, chief executive officer of Saesha Global Trading, said.
“Not just houses though, we can create everything from gazebos to a full-fledged house. It completely depends on what customers want.”
Bamboo is a natural composite material with a high strength to weight ratio, making it ideal for construction of structures. The material has a higher compressive strength than steel and rivals its tensile strength.
Bamboos are used as construction materials in different parts of the world as a green alternate to regular construction practices. These include houses completely made of bamboo, which are earthquake and cyclone resistant. According to Rungta, Indonesian bamboo, with which these houses are made, along with African bamboo, is one of strongest in the world.
The company has leased part of a forest in Indonesia to supply bamboo and as bamboo grows fast, nearly one metre a day, there is no concern of deforestation even if production is increased, she said.
The company has built several bamboo structures in resorts in Jakarta, Bali and other Indonesian cities. It also operates in Dubai, where it has already built a house and plans to start operations in Qatar.
The successful initiatives in the Gulf Cooperation Council region are a testimony to how reliable bamboo structures can be, Rungta said.
“In any weather condition, rain or a lot of heat, the structure remains strong and there is no problem with using it. Moreover, all modern amenities, such as ACs, electricity and water supply, can all be incorporated into it. We also treat the bamboo with methyl bromide as an insecticide and treatment for termites,” she added.
Although prices of these houses depend on customer specifications, they are going to be cheaper than wood and way cheaper than concrete housing, Rungta pointed out.