Sustainable Development

Summary of roundtables and open discussion

Stan Kawaguchi

INTRODUCTION

FIDIC 2000, which was held in Honolulu, Hawaii, U.S.A. from September 10-14, 2000, had as its theme SUSTAINABILITY: THE CHALLENGE OF THE NEW MILLENNIUM.  Sustainability is a long-term issue, and is an issue that should capture the interest of all peoples, but in particular the younger peoples of the world.  Sustainability is also a growing business issue, since as stated in FIDIC’s Task Force 21 Report (TF 21), “Increasingly, sustainability will become the most ;important criteria for project acceptability”. 

TF 21, entitled Engineering Our Future, speaks to the challenges that face our consulting engineering industry and the actions we must undertake to successfully face these challenges.  In the area of sustainability, TF 21 contains the following statements:

• FIDIC must enhance its role as global representative.

• FIDIC must provide leadership.

• FIDIC must be proactive.

• Consulting engineers and related professionals have many opportunities to establish their interests and take a major role in sustainable development.

• Consultants must be prepared to “walk the talk” on ethical and sustainability issues.

• Promote our commitment to sustainable development.

• FIDIC will “lead” by providing leadership within the industry, and in society by presenting the opinions, positions and attitudes of the industry to society, thus strengthening the profile of the consulting industry and reinforcing its commitment to ethics and a sustainable future.

TF 21 clearly identifies sustainability as a major issue that begs for leadership, especially from the world’s engineering industry since its implementation involves the development of clear definition of sustainability and “how to” tools and methods for its implementation.  In summary, sustainability is ripe for the proactive involvement of FIDIC.

The hope of the organizers of FIDIC 2000 and the members of FIDIC’s Sustainable Development Task Group (SDTG) was that the significance and long-term challenge of sustainability would be understood by the delegates, and they would then provide input for the development of a FIDIC sustainability action plan, which would carry over to FIDIC 2001 to be held in Montreux, Switzerland in September 2001. 

This report describes the program approach used in the sustainability program track for  FIDIC 2000, summarizes the results of the individual roundtable discussions and the plenary session discussion, and will discuss possible next steps that FIDIC can undertake.

SUSTAINABILITY TRACK PROGRAM APPROACH

The program for FIDIC 2000 was organized around two separate program tracks - the sustainability track, which is the focus of this report, and the business track.  The sustainability track contained two distinct parts - the plenary sessions during which invited speakers spoke on the issue of sustainability, and the roundtable and plenary open discussion sessions, during which delegates discussed and provided input into the development of FIDIC’s action plan on sustainability.  

For the plenary sessions on sustainability, all delegates were kept together.  In addition, in order to provide continuity through the sessions on sustainability, Mr. Jim Poirot was the moderator for all of the plenary sessions. 

The first session was a forum on sustainability, which commenced immediately after the Opening Ceremony.  The purpose of this forum was to:

• Introduce the subject of sustainability and to identify what other engineering organizations, worldwide were doing in the area of sustainability,

• To provide, as an example, sustainability activities in Southeast Asia and,

• To introduce the idea that sustainability should in fact be viewed as a business opportunity for consulting engineering firms. 

The speakers were Mr. Jose Medem Sanjuan, President of the World Federation of Engineering Organizations, and Mr. William Wallace from ACEC-US.  Mr. Phillippe Bergeron, was also scheduled to speak, but due to an unexpected last minute board meeting was unable to attend.  Mr. Poirot summarized Mr. Bergeron’s paper for the attendees.  All of the speaker’s papers were published in the conference compendium, to include Mr. Bergeron’s paper. 

Following the Monday morning forum, Mr. Maurice Strong delivered the keynote luncheon speech.  He spoke on the importance of consulting engineers getting involved with ongoing discussions on sustainability and in this regard pledged his support to FIDIC.

On Tuesday morning, the opening plenary session included talks by Professor Geping Qu of China and Professor Kenzo Toki of Japan.  Professor Qu spoke on the general topic of sustainability with special emphasis on activities in China as a developing country.  Professor Toki introduced the concept of planning and designing for natural disasters as an integral part of sustainability considerations. 

Also on Tuesday morning, Rolf Saegesser and Bernd Kordes of FIDIC’s SDTG presented FIDIC’s latest draft of its Sustainability Strategy Paper and Business Guidelines. 

Following lunch, roundtable discussion groups on sustainability were organized.  The groups were asked to address four questions on sustainability, and were asked to report their conclusions/thoughts during the Wednesday morning plenary discussion group session.  The conclusions/thoughts of the three roundtables are summarized in the next section of this report.

On Wednesday morning during a plenary open discussion session, the three roundtable leaders reported out the discussion of their respective groups, after which an open facilitated discussion was held on the report of the roundtables.  The results of this discussion are also summarized in this report. 

SUMMARY OF ROUNDTABLE DISCUSSION GROUPS

The four questions that each of the three Tuesday afternoon roundtables were asked to respond to were:

1. What is the status of the sustainability discussion in your home country?
2. What comments do you have on FIDIC’s Sustainability Strategy Paper and Business Guideline, based on what you have heard and seen.
3. Is the sustainability checklist (Appendix 1 to the Business Guideline) usable?  Is anything missing?
4. How can FIDIC and/or your member association help in generating future business opportunities from the area of sustainability?

 A compilation of the combined thoughts from the three roundtable groups on each of the four questions follows:

What is the status of the sustainability discussion in your home country?

• Well written with a broad perspective.  Good start but needs follow-up actions.
• Need to include “Sustainability Ethics”.

• Need to examine social and economic aspects.

• Need to include case studies by collecting information from the World Bank, ADB, etc.
• Many of the social and economic aspects can be covered in a detailed checklist.
• Need to examine the time schedule for upgrading the guidelines.  Do we have enough time before the next FIDIC conference?

• Must use common sense approach.

• Specialists need to see the “whole picture”.
• Experts must respect the opinions/views of others and balance what they know with the knowledge of others.

 Is the Sustainability Checklist usable?  Is anything missing?

• General comments:
  • Tends to focus on negative environmental items.  Need to include positive evaluations.
  • Focuses too much the environment.  Need to include social and economic aspects.
  • Environmental, social, and economic aspects have to be balanced.
  • Invite social and economic experts for advice.
• In the area of social issues, need to include public and community involvement, involvement of stakeholders, and poverty concerns.
• Need to include life cycle costing under economic concerns.
• Extend the timeframe by making it longer.  Sustainable development is a long term issue.
• Need more solutions/ideas.
• Under building construction add the usage and disposal of waste materials.
• Dangerous to call this a “checklist”, since this is not the complete answer.  Consider the use of titles such as “Examples”, “Considerations”, etc.
• Consider cross border impacts.

How can FIDIC and/or your MA help in generating future business opportunities?

General comments:

• Education seminars (communication to government and other stakeholders).
• Identification of and information on case studies.
• Framework/definition of sustainable development.  Need to move from theory to application.
• Publicity.
• Information exchange.
• Get engineers involved early.
• Identify ways to do technology transfer to developing countries.
• Involvement of other NGO’s to include community organizations, for the purpose of developing common goals.
• Sustainability project awards.
• Help develop a new image on the value of the engineer.
• Material selection website.
• Provide “proof” of sustainable development project  -  project certification to clients.
• Involve universities in the definition of sustainable development.
• Develop a connection between QBS and sustainable development.

Specifically for FIDIC:

• Develop the guidelines to a level that the MA’s or firms can use it to approach clients with the purpose of creating interest and therefore business opportunities.
• Increase the visibility of FIDIC by expanding cooperation with other organizations.
• On the global level organizations to cooperate with are UNDP, UNEP, ISO, GRI (Global Reporting Initiative), WFEO, IFI’s (World Bank, ADB, etc.), WBCSD (World Business Council for Sustainable Development), ICLEI, Mediterranean Sustainability Commission, and other regional sustainable development commissions.
• Develop and execute a program, to include seminars, that will promote and educate governments, MA’s, firms, and individuals on sustainability.
• Publish the final document.

• Study the guidelines, translate it, and promote it to member firms and individuals through seminars.

• Promote the guidelines to national and local governments and clients.
• Use the guidelines and strategy paper as powerful tools to persuade clients that LCA and QBS are the most effective and economical methods of procurement.

SUMMARY OF PLENARY DISCUSSION

 Following the reports from the three roundtables, it was decided that the combined input to the four questions discussed by the roundtables, could be grouped into four broad areas of action.  These four areas are:

• PRINCIPLES
• PUBLICITY/EDUCATION
• PARTNERSHIPS
• TOOLS

Principles of sustainability would first need to be agreed to after which FIDIC will need to publicize these principles through an education program.  This education program will need to be directed both externally (client groups and the general public) as well as internally (MA’s and member firms).  To accomplish this partnerships need to formed.  Simultaneously, tools to incorporate the principles of sustainability into projects will need to be developed by FIDIC. 

An open facilitated discussion was then held on each of these four areas, and the suggestions that arose out this discussion are summarized below: 

Principles

Publicity/Education

1. Cooperative university training program such as Tsinghua University to include a FIDIC certificate for sustainable development.
2. Shanghai international conference.
3. Image building to be able to find people that can do the job.
4. Manuals that can be adapted to different markets.
5. High level people for implementation.
6. CNAEC working to develop a masters program with Tsinghua University.  It is hoped that this program can be co-sponsored by FIDIC.
7. Certification by FIDIC for masters programs.
8. Flexible educational tools to adapt to specific needs.
9. Shanghai issues:  Four main topics to cover water, waste management, Industries, and green construction.  Intention of joint meetings/seminars co-sponsored by FIDIC and IFI’s.
10. SDTG should have membership from LDC’s.
11. Guides are less useful in LDC’s.  Need new guidelines, especially for IFI’s.
12. Regional training sessions.

Partnerships

1. Cooperation with IFI’s and MA’s on the implementation of remediation work.
2. Rio 2002 – FIDIC has to be there.  How?
3. Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) is an important partner.
4. Partnerships with IFI’s.
5. FIDIC should develop more partnerships.
6. Need to partner with social, economic and educational groups, not just IFI’s.
7. Organizations to partner with are UNEP, ISO, GRI, WFEO, WB, ADB, OTHER IFI’S, ICLEI, ETC.

Tools

Action Plan Idea

1. More cooperation between FIDIC and MA’s.
2. MA’s should work towards the development of comprehensive plans for traffic and road planning, etc. 
3. Develop a plan for the exchange of young engineers between developed and developing countries. 
4. SDTG should be made a standing committee of FIDIC with a balanced membership (incl. developed and developing countries, as well as geographic representation).
5. MA’s should develop their own action plans on sustainable development, which should then be submitted to FIDIC for incorporation into a global action plan. 
6. Task Force has to be available and needs to move fast to be ahead of the learning curve.
7. Promote more of an awareness of Agenda 21.
8. Promote FIDIC’s visibility.
9. Need technology transfer.
10. Develop integrity management links to sustainability.
11. Demographic imbalance.
12. Need sustainability ethics.
13. Need practical guidelines for use in approaching client groups.
14. Development of case histories.
15. Develop a unified definition of sustainability.
16. Sustainable development project contest and awards.
17. Sustainability versus economics.
18. “Holistic” approach – experts under one roof concept.