Discussing the downturn

Where is Kuwait in all of this?
Ahmed Al Hashimi: Nothing really seems to be happening there. We’ve been chasing just one job at the airport for many months now.
Eveleigh: I’m not sure it’s particularly an international market. Even though Bahrain and Oman are smaller markets, they’ve attracted some international names to work there but Kuwait doesn’t seem to have.
Ray: The problem in Kuwait is that projects take ages to be conceptualised, ages for the contract to be awarded and then when it is, it’s dropped. This is very time consuming. Recently two major projects got cancelled due to a parliamentary decision – sometimes democracy and business don’t go together either. It’s a tough market. Only the Koreans are there in the refineries.

Has health and safety improved?
Dessoy: There’s been a huge change since ten years ago.
Mark Wiltshire: It’s a lot better than it was but there’s a long way to go. Working at height is still the most important issue.
Al Hashimi: The industry probably needs more health and safety training.
Wiltshire: The other thing that we must be careful of, is that over the past six months a lot of the skilled labour has gone back to Asia, and when things kick off again we’re going to have to train the new ones again.
Eveleigh: Your’e right, health and safety is a constant battle. You’ve got to keep on driving it. It’s number one on our agendas always. You’ve got to keep it at the forefront.
Wiltshire: I think due to competitiveness, there’s pressure on everybody to reduce the cost of what they’re producing as well, and we have to be careful of the quality of some of the materials we’re using in formwork, so that we’re not getting a dodgy batch due to pressure on suppliers to reduce costs.
Darren Ellwood: Requests for tests are now being asked for on everything by the RTA.
Dessoy: Yes, but sometimes the materials are good but the design is wrong.

How big an issue is counterfeiting?
Wiltshire: We’ve been seeing a lot of that.
Dessoy: We don’t buy from here. We buy directly from Europe.
Ellwood: It is, but it depends on which contractor you’re dealing with. Price at the moment is the biggest driving factor. If somebody sells you something, which looks exactly the same but for half the price, it tends to change one’s mind. We see a lot of smaller firms going for these products.

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Are designs becoming more functional?
Al Hashimi: It depends who the client is. My personal view is, clients tend to get architects to design buildings from the outside, for the appearance first and foremost, without too much attention to the function. And a lot of the time, an architect is engaged from the UK, the US or the Far East, with a name of course, to do the concept. That design is then given to a local architect who is told to turn it into a 400-apartment building. In an ideal world, the client should assemble the design team from the very beginning along with the contractors and architects and allow everyone to talk to one another.
Eveleigh: Yes, I think an integrated team needs to be put together and allowed to work on the concept. If you apply that model you stand a chance of eliminating a lot of risks including redesign or useless construction.
Wiltshire: Even involving the supply chain.
Dessoy: Yes, you can save time, money and effort by getting it right the first time.
Al Hashimi: On every project you can guarantee that the client will ask you to put various options on the table for the structure, architecture and MEP, with some sort of evaluation. So with the contractor being part of this, he will be able to say which options would be the best so it’s very useful.
Wiltshire: Also from a contractor’s point of view it doesn’t waste time dreaming up an alternative, which has a design constraint.
Ray: I have seen projects where the piling has been completed without finishing structural design and when they submit it to the Dubai Municipality, a lot of things have to be changed. But because of time pressures then, everything was rushed, but now, things will become better.

BIOS

Philippe Dessoy
General Manager, Six Construct, has over 24 years experience in construction throughout Europe, the Middle East and Africa. He has a civil engineering degree from the University of Brussels, Belgium.

Ani Ray
Country Director, Simplex Infrastructure, is an engineer with more than 20 years experience in power, steel and metals, oil and gas and airport construction.

Ahmed Al Hashimi
Associate Director – Head of Structural and Civil Division, Meinhardt Dubai, is a chartered structural engineer with 24 years experience in the design and management of building structures. He has a civil engineering degree from the University of Glasgow.

Mark Wiltshire
Chief Engineer – Middle East and South Asia, Laing O’Rourke, is a chartered engineer with 30 years of experience in the industry. He also heads up design management and engineering for Aldar Laing O’Rourke.

Jonathan Eveleigh
Middle East Business Development Manager, Laing O’Rourke has been with Laing O’Rourke for 24 years, nine of which, have been in the UAE. He is a member of the Chartered Institute of Building, UK.

Darren Ellwood
UAE General Manager, RMD Kwikform works out of the company’s Sharjah office and was previously sales manager at RMD Kwikform.