What authorities in Belize and Quintana Roo, Mexico and scientists never imagined in their wildest dreams, Omar Vasquez Sanchez has done! He built the first house entirely made of Sargassum, which could represent a worldwide milestone.
Omar Sánchez Vázquez originally from Jalisco, lived part of his childhood in California, USA and returned Mexico to fulfill his “Mesican dream” in his birth country and created a new industry with organic materials that preserve the culture and environment.
“I’m just a simple Gardner with a love for nature,” stated Sanchez Vazquez. “I built my first home and named it after my mother “Casa Angelita” who taught me to respect the earth and value all things in life.”
Omar is the owner of a nursery in Puerto Morelos and the director of Blue Green Mexico which has generated jobs to hundreds of people with all kinds of addictions including alcohol, drugs, anxiety, desperation and others who simply have the desire to want to work.
“I come to share a solution that is working against the problem of sargassum in Mesxico,” stated Omar. “We use 20k tons of sargassum to make 2,150 blocks and we currently have 100,000 blocks made and stored, enough to build 50 houses.”
He explained that these houses are perfect for low income families as they are not expensive like cement bricks and have a durability of 120 years. The blocks are 100% organic (60% Sargassum 40% organic material), thermic and improves acoustics and are hand made.
“The sea is wise and is trying to tell us something. The arrival of sargassum is all our fault,” stated Omar. “Feeling guilt myself I started doing these blocks. We need to take responsibility and take out the sargassum, help clean, generate employment, build the product and build houses. I have the patent for these blocks and other construction materials to be done out of sargassum.”
Omar gave his word to those in attendance to donate the first ever Sargasso house to San Pedro, Ambergris Caye. He is willing to share his ideas and have workers come to the island and work on cleaning up the island. This is a great opportunity for the island and Mayor Daniel Guerrero has accepted to visit his company in Mahahual, Mexico to better understand the concept of how things are done and to arrange for this to happen in our lovely island.
Present at the meeting were Mayor Daniel Guerrero, Mr. Andre Perez, Gary Greif, Jan Brown, BTIA representatives – Karen Brodie and Terry Anderson, BHA representatives Sandra Van Noord and Roannie Badillo and representatives of The Belize Tourism Board. Special thanks to Banana Beach Resort for having organized this meeting.
