N.Z. Houses For Noumea

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32303, 22 May 1970, Page 1

N.Z. Houses For Noumea

A Christchurch businessman has started filling an order for worker accommodation ir New Caledonia worth $90,000. It includes an order for furniture and other domestic fittings worth $lB,OOO.

The businessman is Mr M. E. Fraemohs, of Burwood, whose client, Societe Generale d’Enterprises, of Noumea, will send a ship to Lyttelton to pick up the entire order. Mr Fraemohs, a civil engineer, is prefabricating a camp for workers who will be brought from Europe to build a big industrial town in New Caledonia.

During the next five years the French Government plans to admit 100,000 Europeans to New Caledonia to exploit the huge nickel deposits on the island. At pre-

sent 25 per cent of the world’s nickel comes from Noumea.

The island is acutely short of labour and building materials. By 1975 an additional 13,500 houses have to be built in Noumea at the rate of 2700 a year.

Mr Fraemohs’ order could be the forerunner of much larger orders involving millions of dollars. The firm he is dealing with'is reputed to have construction work worth sloom in New Caledonia and Tahiti. The French Government has given the free import of building materials and goods to New Caledonia for one year to countries other than those in the European Common Market.

Mr Fraemohs has turned down an order for a hotel and motel unit estimated to cost $250,000 but has another smaller order for five chalettype houses worth $lB,OOO. When his first contract is

ready for shipment he will fly 10 carpenters to Noumea to erect the camp. He will also send carpet layers and other tradesmen required to install the domestic equipment. This includes beds, blankets, sheets, furniture, refrigerators, bars, tables, chairs and wardrobes.

Mr Fraemohs says that to supply 500 houses a year to Noumea would require 2.5 to 3 million super feet of radiata timber.

He will negotiate no further contracts in Noumea until he has completed his present order. His houses are his own design, based on a method of construction which is widely used in Scandinavia. Apart from the roofing material and window frames the entire houses are made of timber. There are no nails used in the assembly of the walls, which are three-ply laminated

lengths of 6in by lin treated radiata.

The houses resemble a log cabin construction modernised by factory pre-cutting methods. A permanent interlocking of the timber Cuts out nailing. The Canterbury holiday resort demand for these houses is now greater than the manufacturers can meet.

Mr Fraemohs emigrated from Denmark in 1948. He has taken especial interest in the exploitation of New Zealand timber as a means .of increasing foreign exchange. This process refines timber as much as possible before exporting it. Mr Fraemohs said he had had much help from the Department of Industries and Commerce in winning orders in New Caledonia. The sketch shows a house similar to those Mr Fraemohs will export to New Caledonia.