ENGINEERING IS DEVELOPMENT (Serialised) No 15

Challenges Of Development

This is the 15th and penultimate edition of the serialisation of the book, Engineering Is Development. As we prepare to close the series, we thank all those who have patiently followed us, particularly those who gave gave feedback and liked the publications. Thank you very much. Surely, there has been lots of learning as we all engaged with the contents. Now, suggestions regarding what to do next are gathering steam. We shall give more information on this next week. Again, remember that aside downloading the book on the link above, you can get also a copy from ACEN on (abolajiogunsanya@acen.org.ng).

One of the major purposes of history must be for people to understand how the seemingly discreet and independent events of the past explain why things are the way they are today, and with this understanding, hopefully, predict and better manage the future. The historical and contemporary political, economic and social events in the world have direct impacts on engineering development, as indeed on all other developments. Engineering is, however, peculiar in that it provides the solutions to those developments that are dependent on our understanding of the basic forces of nature.

National Development Planning Framework

In the development of the Regional Plan for Ogun State, Comprehensive Project Management Services (CPMS) Limited developed a framework for regional development planning. This framework identified key areas that must be strategically addressed for the holistic and comprehensive development of a region. The seven key areas identified were further broken down into twenty-three component parts as discussed in the book.

NIGERIA’S DEVELOPMENT CHALLENGES

Let us address the developmental challenges facing Nigeria in each of the sub-sectors.

Population Management

It is a shame that we, as a nation, do not know within an acceptable degree of confidence, how many we are. Our censuses have remained controversial, with each state, local government, and even towns, claiming populations as they desire. The fact is that technology has moved beyond this point, and we should be able to determine, with good accuracy, how many we are. Our spatial distribution and demographics should also be correct and accurate. It is when we have good base data that we can make projections for the future. This is the beginning of any meaningful planning. We also have to keep good records of movement of people so as to be able to plan for them.

Land Use Management

Our land ownership and holding tenures are confused and not responsive to our development. The law says that the state governor is the custodian of all the land in the state he governs. In practice, however, multiple payments have to be made to the state government and several other parties claiming ownership. The process is confusing, tedious and often threatening to lives. The lack of regional, country and town planning has resulted in environmental squalor. We need to have plans at the country, state, local government and township levels that are well integrated. These plans will need to build on the population data, physical characteristics of the land as well as our developmental objectives.

Economic Development

The strategy for economic development must be hinged on developing capacity and capability across a broad sector of economic activities. We have primary advantages in agriculture and mining by virtue of what nature has endowed us with. We have, however, not been able to develop ourselves to take full advantage of these. Our agricultural products remain primary products with very low value added. Our mines are explored and exploited only by foreign experts and expertise. These will not lead to economic development.

Provision of Physical Infrastructure

There are five main physical infrastructures in the world today. These are transportation, water supply, power supply, waste management and information and communication technology, ICT. There is really no way any country is going to develop without any of them. Transportation is perhaps the biggest, and is further divided into roads, rails, air, sea and piped transport. The country is today in short supply of all these infrastructures. Road transport is inadequate and in poor condition with frequent deaths on our roads. Nigeria spent billions of Naira in the seventies and eighties to create a large and good quality network of roads and highways. Neglect through poor maintenance culture and lack of additional roads have resulted in a very poor and unsafe road network. The consequences of these to the quality of life are self-evident in the travel times, life span of vehicles and the high degree of inconvenience to citizens.

Provision of Social Infrastructure

Social infrastructures are addressed in four broad sectors of Education, Health Care, Housing and Sports and Recreation. Together with physical infrastructures, they impact on people’s lives on a daily basis. Education is the foundation of all developments. It is a well-established fact that education is the critical panacea to most of the backwardness of developing countries. High literacy level ensures that basic information can reach most people, and knowledge can be acquired just for the asking. A critical goal is thus to ensure that the whole population can read and write. Nigeria is still under pressure to ensure adequate infrastructure for the provision of basic education.

Human Capital Development

By their productive activities, people create the wealth in any society. Development can therefore only be achieved by a society that has mastered the art of mobilising and developing its citizenry for efficient productive and activities. The outcome would then be improved quality of lives in all its ramifications. Nigeria often ranks very poorly in human development assessment in the world. She ranked 159 out of 177 countries surveyed for the UN Human Development Index (HDI) 2006. In addition to the GDP, other parameters measured in the survey include life expectancy, adult literacy and enrolment at the primary, secondary and tertiary institutions, and income and purchasing power parity, PPP.

Good Governance, Law and Order, Peace and Security

Good governance, law and order, meaningful engagement and prosperity promote peace and security. The six main sectors of national planning discussed above directly address the area of meaningful engagement and prosperity. This final section addresses good governance and the rule of law. The challenge with governance is not so much with the ideology or constitution with which we are governed as with the honesty of those who lead us, the fairness in the interpretation and implementation of the various clauses of our constitution, and the application of the rule of law to call erring parties to order. Our elections have been driven, not by issues and policies that would develop and unite us, but by greed, corruption and the exploitation of ethnic and religious differences which should otherwise have been our strength.

ROLE OF ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY IN PROVIDING STRATEGY FORMULATION

National Planning in Nigeria has mostly been in the hands of politicians, economists and sociologists, with not enough emphasis on engineering. Most of the issues we have discussed are, however, rooted in the development of engineering and technology. Virtually all the considerations of economic production (agriculture, mining, manufacturing and construction) and physical infrastructure (transportation, water supply, power supply, waste management and ICT), are predominantly driven by engineering. Two other development sectors, Land Use (Ownership & Tenure, Land Use Plan), and Social Infrastructure (Education, Health Care, Housing, Sports & Recreation) have considerable engineering and technology input without which significant progress cannot be achieved. The remaining three sectors, Population (Population Growth, Migration), Human Capital Development (Orientation, Life Time Engagement), and Good Governance, Law and Order, Peace and Security are not primarily engineering driven, but can benefit immensely from engineering and technology.

Too frequently, engineering inputs are considered as operational details to be invited when the policy decisions have been taken, rather than strategic inputs at the formulation of policies and strategies themselves. This is the wrong approach to development planning which has not, and will not lead to meaningful development.

GLOBAL CHALLENGES

Some specific examples of national and global challenges for which engineering and technology must provide strategic solutions are as follows.

Population Explosion

One of the most challenging problems in the world today is the continuous increase in population. Just over fifty years ago, the population of the world was only two billion people. Today, it is estimated to be over 7 billion, and projected to rise to over 10 billion in the next thirty years. This huge increase in population is putting severe pressures on planet earth and its resources.

Depletion of Natural Resources

Human activities have severe consequences on the earth. With an increasing population and continuously improving quality of life, the rate at which natural resources are being consumed is now much greater than the natural replacement rates, and the ability of the earth to sustain this level of exploitation is now being questioned. Examples of these include fossil fuel, deforestation, over-fishing, land reclamation, etc.

Management of Toxic Wastes

In addition to the excessive consumption of slow or non-replaceable natural resources, human activities also generate wastes which pollute the natural environment. Solid, liquid and gaseous wastes from industrial and domestic processes contaminate the natural environment leading to the destruction of fauna and flora and altering the composition and natural balance of naturally occurring protective materials. The major causes of this are the industrial production processes of the developed world, burning of fossil fuel through gas flaring, transportation and bush fire.

Coping with Climate Change

There is now confirmatory evidence that the earth is warming up, with severe consequences on the earth as we know it. This temperature rise has been caused by the increase in the amount of greenhouse gases, principally carbon dioxide, released into the atmosphere. These gases form a thick blanket in the atmosphere trapping the sun’s heat hence increasing the temperature of the earth. They thereby exhibit a phenomenon called the greenhouse effect, due to the similarity in their reactions in the atmosphere to what obtains in a gardener’s greenhouse. This rise in temperature is called global warming and it has dire consequences on the world climate.

Global Water Supply and Food Production

Another major consequence of global warming is its impact on world water supply. Firstly, settlements that depend on the cyclic freezing of rain water and thawing of ice for their water will no longer have fresh water supply once the glaciers are gone. This would be catastrophic for many cities at the foot of mountains. Secondly, rainfall distribution around the world will change radically. With increasing temperature, more evaporation will take place. With higher humidity and temperatures, heavier precipitation will take place. The prevalence of droughts and floods, hurricanes and typhoons and other severe weather conditions does not favour food production. Already, several countries, mostly the poor ones, are suffering the severe consequences of this with poor harvests and people dying of starvation.

Ensuring Adequate Global Energy Supply

Much of world energy is today provided by fossil fuel. This is a non-renewable material and the total world reserve is estimated to be enough for at most 50 years at the present rate of consumption. The second most used process is nuclear energy, with the challenges of managing the consequential toxic waste. There is a strong need for the world to seek renewable energy. Alternatives that are being considered include the sea, solar, wind, geo-thermal, biomass, biogas and bioliquid energy sources. The world needs to use less energy and at the same time produce energy efficiently and in a sustainable manner.

Defence and Security

Weapons of war and mass destruction continue to be manufactured in the world, creating a tense and non-peaceful world. The percentage of the GDP put into the arms and war is so large today that if this was diverted to solving other world problems, significant progress would be made. This investment in defence and security is in all facets of the society, from education to research, from manufacturing to actual wars that lead to destruction of lives and properties.

As mentioned earlier, the book serialisation is coming to an end, but the conversation does not have to. Indeed, it must not.

Bayo Adeola +234(0)8022910259; kaa@cpmslimited.com; www.cpmslimited.com