Appropriate Technology

Using what you have to make what you need.

Helping families have access to clean water, food, shelter, and more.

“I am passionate about AT for many reasons. It meets real needs of people around the world. It touches so many aspects of daily life, from providing tools and techniques for building a structurally sound home to providing clean drinking water, to agricultural tools that enable a farmer to provide for his family and beyond. God has created man to be innovative. This innovative spirit can be seen all around the world through appropriate technologies.”

ECHO’s AT Manager, Elliott Toevs Tweet

We

TEST

By testing out appropriate technologies, ECHO bears the risk of trying something new.

We

SHARE

When we are confident that technologies are viable, affordable and culturally appropriate, we introduce them to our network of missionaries and development workers serving in more than 190 countries around the world.

We give

HOPE

Communities are finding solutions to end hunger, water-borne diseases, smoke-related health problems, post-harvest food losses and more.

Our Appropriate Technologies

Some of the promising low-cost technologies that ECHO is researching, developing and sharing:

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Reliable storage methods for seeds when there’s no electricity

The earthbag seed bank demonstrates a method for controlling daily temperature fluctuations that does not rely on air conditioners. Capable of limiting interior temperature fluctuations to 1-2 degrees, earth bags are able to maintain seed viability for the next season.

Low-cost solar dryers to preserve food and improve nutrition

A lot of food grown in developing countries never makes it to people’s bellies. Without refrigeration, it rots during transport or when farmers fail to sell it immediately at markets. ECHO is working on low-cost solar dehydrators that work without fans, a technology that often isn’t available to resource-poor farmers.

Conservation agriculture equipment to repair degraded soils and boost crop production

Access to affordable and easy-to-maintain farming equipment is a challenge in many places. Adapted from an Ethiopian plow, ECHO East Africa has been developing, testing and adjusting the no-till Maresha planter to arrive at a practical design that can be affordably built from local materials.

ECHO is working on a practical, affordable design for the Maresha planter, a direct seeder for single and multi-row plantings of common crops such as maize and beans. Testing out one of ECHO’s recent protoypes, a farmer from the Ekenywa village of Arusha, Tanzania said, “Planting beans on this farm usually takes my family two days of hard work, but now look! It has taken only three hours.”

The food for more than three billion people worldwide is cooked over wood, charcoal or kerosene fires.

ECHO’s Appropriate Technology trainings in biogas empower families to use manure to create clean cooking fuel for their homes. 

 
Read: The Impact of Biogas in East Africa

Tour the Appropriate Technology Village

Our Anderson Appropriate Technology Center is applied science at its best. Our facility is a unique working space focused on demonstrating, researching, and building tools/techniques that solve problems for small-scale farmers around the world.

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A student learns the mechanics of moving water

ECHO provides hands-on and experiential STEM activities for local Southwest Florida students. At the Anderson Appropriate Technology Center, young people get to explore some of the challenges that make life difficult for families worldwide.

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