Award of a $12,500 contract to study the economic feasibility of manufacturing a wide variety of building materials on or near the Navajo Indian Reservation in Arizona, New Mexico and Utah was announced today by the Department of the Interior.
The study will be conducted by the Armour Research Foundation of Chicago, Ill., and is, in effect, an expansion of a study initiated last December. Under the first contract, which was for $15,700, the Foundation was to study the feasibility of manufacturing concrete blocks and was required to submit a report in four months. Under the new contract, the study will be broadened to include other building materials such as cement, ready mixed concrete, brick, structural clay tile, gypsum products, concrete pipe, concrete beams, and stone facing. The completion date has been extended for five months from May 16.
The study is one of 39 which the Bureau of Indian Affairs has initiated under contract during the past 10 months to explore the feasibility of various types of economic developments on or near Indian reservations. Forty-seven reservations in 19 States are involved in these studies. Nine of the studies have been completed and are now under review.
