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Sustainable Development: Role of Engineers

Unless there is a sense of urgent need for our human resources to be appropriately groomed to address the challenges ahead of us, our progress will not only be hampered but decelerated.

by Dr M Shahjahan
urrounded on three sides by India and Myanmar and on the south by the Bay of Bengal. Bangladesh is a small riverine flat country. Geomorphologically, the whole country may be considered as a big alluvial bed hydraulic laboratory. Though the country is small ills nonetheless prone to numerous large scale and complicated natural problems like dense population pressure, meagre land-man ratio, high water-land ratio In monsoon (reverse is the case in lean period), recurrent floods, droughts, cyclones, tornadoes. erosion and siltation. drainage congestion and currently the complicated arsenic problem with drinking water in almost 60 per cent of the country. As a result the poor people are constantly battling with natural calamities and for the basic necessities of life like food and clothing. Unless there is wholehearted comprehensive plans and programmes for sustainable development, the future seems bleak and gloomy.
The concept of sustainable development is to meet all basic requirements of the people like food, clothing, shelter, health and employment with the available resources but without compromising the ability of the future generations to meet their own needs. Moreover, it is to seek a balance between the environment and development, considering the economy, social life, public health and general well-being of the people. The socio-economlsts most of the time blame the engineers and technologists for designing schemes of development that are not sustainable Though nature has the capacity to withstand any change In the ecosystem, it takes its own time to heal. But when the exploitation is too great then
it may take hundreds of years to get back to the Initial stage. Moreover, the development scenario is based on the developed North because their strong foundation is economy and not ecology. But presently they have also realised that the ultimate objective is to achieve a balance between economy and ecology.
The important conditions for sustainability in Bangladesh are equity and social justice, endogenous choice, economic efficiency and ecological harmony. Bangladesh with a high population growth rate of 2.5 per cent per annum over the last two decades has had difficulty in meeting its needs for food, water, healthcare, sanitation, shelter, employment, energy and productive land and is destroying its environment in the process. Its plight will be more severe unless the population growth rate is substantially lowered. And our economy will not be sound and speedy development will not take place as long as pollution continues to prematurely kill our vital manpower. With a per capita GDP of USD 220-230 per annum, about half of the total population is reported to be groaning under the shackles of poverty. Alleviation of poverty is one of the principal objectives of the government of Bangladesh.
In such a dreadful social, economic and environmental situation the engineers of Bangladesh particularly those who have graduated from BUET. BITs and reputed private universities and colleges should come for-
ward to assist Ln the country's development. The engineers should now march ahead to ensure sustainable development with quality global engineering. They have to adapt themselves with the ever changing technological advancement based on multi-disciplinary approach. Their tendency to acqui re mono-disciplinary knowledge should be shaken off to cope with the fast moving time. For example a civil engineer may h^ve to acquire knowledge in water resources or environmental engineering. He may further need to adapt himself to the duties of a computational engineer or acquire knowledge in information technology. Unless one updates his knowledge through continuous professional development (CPD), he will become redundant to his professional practice. This trend has already emerged In the developed world and similar wind Is blowing for adoption in the undeveloped or underdeveloped or least developed countries (LDC) like Bangladesh.
Normally scientists and engineers around the world work on projects considering new alternatives. Though development planning is based on the concept of minimum needs, in which planning priorities and activity targets arc established to meet certain basic minimum needs of present sections of population, the engineers of Bangladesh in most of the cases are not assimilated in the final policy-making process in the structural hierar-
chy. As a ■ consequence final decision-making is done without their participation and the projects ultimately turn out to be inefficient and stretched beyond the stipulated time horizon.
Since almost 80 per cent of National Development Budget is spent through the hands of engineers in Bangladesh, their role in nation building is very vital. In the process an engineer should realise the fact that the technology incorporated for sustainable development should be con-stantly updated, so that gradually he can achieve the goal to strike a balance between economy and ecology. They should not forget the concept of eco-friendly technology which is ecology friendly but at the same time economically sound.
The engineers of Bangladesh as well as those of other LDCs also have to make sure that the technology of the developed countries which they import, is sustainable. There are numerous instances where technology has failed to cater to the needs of ecology and economy. The manufacturing products may be economically cost-effective or competitive but the manufacturing process may be obsolete and environmentally unfriendly. They should also remember the hard truth that persistent poverty contributed to accelerating the degradation of productive natural resources, particularly in the least developed countries (LDC) like Bangladesh.
Moreover, to attain sustainability, practising engi-
neers. engineers in education and professional institutions have to play key roles In their respective fields. Practising engineers should expand their domain of knowledge and get themselves acquainted with the effects of globalisation. Engineers in education,should produce innovative engineers with excellent communication skills to upgrade the quality of engineering. Educational institutions can play a significant role for professional development of engineers through organising seminars, symposia, lectures and training programmes. The engineering community at the same time has to create pressure on the authorities concerned, if necessary, to take necessary steps, whenever needed, for sustainable economic and social development of the country. For instance, it is the failure of the government as well as the engineers for not being able to expand optical fibre net in due time which could have saved a lot of foreign currency. The engineers who fly to the developed countries after graduation must transfer their technological achievement to their native country to modernise technology and thereby ensure sustainable development of the country.
Sound planning of any project is essential in the modem concept. For example, during the construction phase of the Jamuna Multipurpose Bridge project. Environmental Impact Assessment (ELA) has been carried out to assess the Impact of erecting the bridge on the whole ecosystem of the project area i.e. the effect of the narrowed down free flow of the water area, erosion and siltation. aggradation and degradation, closure of some of the spill channels of the Jamuna like the Dhaleswari river and even solution of rehabilitation of the evicted people from the project site. So ELA Is potentially one of the most efficient interdisciplinary and decision-making tools with regard to alternatives of development process.
Finally, the engineers and technocrats of Bangladesh at present are lagging far behind the engineers of the developed countries in terms of new technology and multi-disciplinary approach, external exposures, professional development and training. Moreover indigenous R&D which is Die key to Indigenous Innovative solutions to most of our current and future challenges, is not given much emphasis. In addition, the government, the public and private sectors are also not very eager to spend money on research and development. Unless there is a sense of urgent need for our human resources to be appropriately groomed to address the challenges ahead of us. our progress will not only be hampered but decelerated. The education system has also to be thoroughly remodeled to be more suitable, adaptive and need based for the New Millennium.
The writer, former Vice-Chancellor. Bangladesh Unioer sity of Engineering and Technology. Is President, the Institution of Engineers. Bangladesh.