In many parts of the modern world, primary education and basic healthcare are still a privilege, rather than a basic commodity provided by the state. Even with the efforts of several non-governmental organisations and private charities funding plenty in both of these fields, there is still a lot of room for improvement.
The matter of fact is that the state of each country, or the ruling elite, are likely to be the ones most familiar with the dynamics of their demographic. Although their input may assist foreign efforts, they would likely be able to achieve a better result if they have the resources to do it themselves. With the resources to do it themselves, they could do it more thoroughly and with a far more local approach. Penetrating the society and culture is easier for locals than for foreigners that look different and likely speak a different language.
Health Sector
Today, shipping containers are a global phenomenon and even the poorest of the nations relies on these boxes to import and export their products. Therefore, availability of the container is not a problem anywhere. The dimension of the container is large enough to make room for any kind of setup that would be found in a hospital. With over 200 square feet of room available in each container, wards, pharmacies, and small clinics can be made.
This is what is being done today in remote locations and underdeveloped countries where there aren’t enough resources to build an entire hospital or it isn’t strategically possible. Another possible reason is that there just isn’t a large enough population that could fully utilise a full-scale hospital, making shipping containers a more cost-effective answer. Using them, small medical units can be set up in these areas. These units provide basic nursing facilities, first aid, basic checkups and treatments on site.
Education Sector
Similarly, in the education sector, shipping containers are helping to create much more cost-effective facilities. It is often difficult to develop a proper primary school in many parts of the world. Shipping containers are easy to transport and with some basic furnishings inside, they can accommodate a reasonably sized class and school buildings such as the library and office.
In some such regions, it is also difficult to find qualified local teachers and staff. For the staffs that are living on the school campus, the containers can also serve as their accommodation. The containers can be designed into rooms for one or more people and can also have restrooms integrated into them. Since this sort of accommodation and the classrooms are designed from the containers, they have the ability to be easily portable. In the event there is a need to move, they can be conveniently transported and then reused at their new location.
Although these may seem like small changes, any increase in the provision of education and medicine services in those regions is a significant improvement. This is considering that in those regions, healthcare and education were previously rare or inaccessible.