Ali Redha Contributes His Information Technology Towards ... · Ali Redha Contributes His Vision...

Journal of Bahrain Society of Engineers Issue No43D

ecember 2005

Towards Development and Enhancement of Engineering Education

Ali Redha Contributes His Vision About The Progress Of BSE

Information Technology Capabilities in the Kingdom of Bahrain: Strength and Challenges

The Bahrain Socirty of

Engineers

Issue No. 43October 2005

Board of Directors

Mohamed Khalil AlSayedPresident

Masoud E. Al-HarmiVice President

Mohamed Ali Al-KazaiExecutive Secretary

Samih Mahmood Al-AlawiTreasurer

Heyam Al-MaskatiDirector of Informations &

Community Services

Abdulla Ahmed JanahiDirector of Training

Dr. Isa Sulman QambarDirector of Membership

Affairs & Profession

Jamed Khalaf Al-AlawaiDirector of Activities

Fouad Ahmed Al-ShaikhDirector of Conference

Journal Committee

Heyam Al-MaskatiChairman

Eng. AbdulHussain A.AliEditor-in-Chief

Committte Members

Eng. Aqeel Al-AliEng. Youis Hamza

Eng. Hussain MakkiEng. Shatha AlweswasiEng. Reem Al Amadi

Registration No. SBSE 181 at the Ministery of Information

Dea

r Rea

ders Developing the Engineering Cadre is the top priority of the

present board of directors. The board formed a committee comprising engineers from various disciplines and minis-tries. Following an initial study, a consultant was appointed to conduct a scientific study on the present cadre and compareit with those in force locally, regionally and worldwide.

The people who undertook this project faced many difficul-ties and challenges for many reasons, the most important of which was variety of engineering specializations to the extent that made it difficult to contain such differences.

Therefore, and before the release of this cadre, it is impor-tant and useful at the sometime to understand the peculiarity of the engineering sector in order to determine the work pri-ority, in addition to describing the motives that impose the necessity of issuing the new cadre and its impact on various engineering disciplines. This new cadre must reflect in gen-eral the current changes in the engineering market. It must also reflect the pivotal and major role played by the engi-neers in the Government sector and in the architectural and infrastructure development in the Kingdom.

Hence, the activity of the cadre preparation committee is not limited to reformulation of the financial aspects only butalso to the development of engineers academically and pro-fessionally to minimize migration of public sector engineers to private sector and to continue building the engineering structure of the Kingdom.

Finally, we say let us all, whether employees of Government or private sector, endeavor to develop and support the re-lease of the engineering cadre. We hope that issuance of the new regulation will bring prosperity and benefits not only tothe engineers of the public sector but for those working in the private sector as well. The increase of supply in the Gov-ernment sector’s market is expected to have impact on the employment conditions of engineers in the private sector’s market.

Media Committee

In This IssueBahrain Society of Engineers

P.O. Box 835, ManamaKingdom of Bahrain

Tel: 17727100, Fax: 17729819

E-mail:[email protected]

Website:www.mohandis.org

Design by

Printed atUnion Press CompanyP.O. Box 582, ManamaKingdom of Bahrain

* The Bahrain Society of Engineers in not responsible for opinions published in “Al -Mohandis”.

* Please send your articles to the Bahrain Society of Engineers.

* For your ads please call Bahrain Society of Engineers.

43

The Current Crisis In Conservation: Conti-nuity Versus Monu-

mentalization

Towards Development and Enhancement of

Engineering Education

8

14

16Techno-Democratic

Leadership

Ali Redha Contributes His Vision About The

Progress Of BSE

4

A Brief Review Of Re-verse Osmosis Theory

18

A Tablet For Hot Weather Concrete

20

Human Factors En-gineering and Prod-uct Life Cycle Driver Drowsiness Warning

System

22

Pre-Paid Service (PPS)26

TQM Applicability Factors

31

Information Technol-ogy Capabilities in the Kingdom of Bahrain:

Strength and Challenges

33

The Office and Work-place Fire Safety Plan-

ning

28

Our guest in this issue is Engineer Ali Redha, Acting Director of Water Trans-mission Directorate. He graduated from Aleppo University, Syria in 1979. He spoke to us about his opinions about a va-riety of issues.

At the outset, can you give us some infor-mation about yourself, your education and specialization?

I born in 1956 in Makharga, an area located in Manama. I started my primary education at Abu Bakr Al Sadeeq School but one year later I moved to Hassan Ibn Thabet School,

which was located in one of the houses in Bu Serra area which was rented by the Ministry of Education from the fam-ily of my colleague A.Rahman Darwish. In 1968, I joined Al Nayeem Intermediate Secondary School to complete my intermediate education and part of my secondary education in science section. Later, I enrolled in Al Hoora Secondary School to complete my secondary education, and finishedwith grade 85%. I was one of outstanding students and won the third position and hence I was qualified to a Govern-ment scholarship to Ain Shams University in Cairo, Egypt to study dentistry. However, I declined this scholarship since I was interested in general medicine and later I regretted my decision. I submitted my application to study general medicine in Allepo University in Syria, but there was only one seat re-served for Bahrain with this university. My friend and our

Ali Redha Contributes His

Vision About The Progress Of

BSE

Profile

During school days in Al Hoora Secondary School. Copy of the “news” published in newspaper about his travel to Ireland for training.

Al-Mohandis - 434December - 2005

family friend Dr. Ali Jaffar Al Aradi, Orthopedic Consultant at present, whose grade was slightly higher than mine with just one figure (86%) managed to obtain this scholarship.I was accepted to study in the Engineering College. Dr. Al Aradi later changed his mind and enrolled in the University of Basra leaving the medicine seat in Aleppo vacant. Due to the admission regulations in Syria, it was not possible to transfer the seat to another applicant unless the original can-didate assigns the same by being present personally and this was indeed impossible. At that time, I had already attended classes in the Medicine College for almost a half year without registration with permission from university. After I lost hope, I started studying in the second half of the academic year in the Engineering College. However, this period coincided with the beginning of October 1973 War and hence classes were irregu-lar and the life was extremely difficult.In 1979, I graduated from engineering college and obtained bachelor degree in mechanical engineering. I started working with the Ministry of Works, Electricity and Water in January 1980. In 2001, I had the opportunity to study in Sanderland University in Britain to study for master degree in IT manage-ment. I completed my master studies in 2002, thanks to the Bahrain Society of Engineers who nominated me to obtain this scholarship.

Could you talk to us about your practical life and career after coming back to Bahrain? I started working in January 1989 with the Ministry of Works, Electricity and Water as trainee engineer with the Water Net-works Maintenance Unit at the Directorate of Water Supply and I was the first Bahraini engineer to be appointed in thissection. I liked working in this section and learned so much

from the simple workers who devoted themselves to serve this country and its people by maintaining water networks out of their conviction of the importance of water for people even in worst circumstances. During the same year I was sponsored to obtain diploma in water networks with An Fo-ras Forbartha Institute in Dublin, Ireland. In 1983 I was transferred to work with the Directorate of Projects at the same Ministry as project engineer, where I was responsible for executing Ras Abu Jarjor Water Desali-nation Plant. This was the beginning of my career in the fieldof water desalination. Ras Abu Jarjor Project was first ofits kind in the region, if not worldwide. In fact it was a very courageous step to be taken by the Ministry at that time since this was the first desalination plant using reverse osmoticpressure with a capacity of 10 million gallons per day. With the commissioning of the Ras Abu Jarjor Plant, I was promoted to senior operating engineer and I continued work-ing with this plant until Al Door Water Desalination Plant was commissioned when I was appointed as head of opera-tion section in 1988. In 1990, I became in charge of Al Door Plant until 2005 when I was appointed as Acting Director of Water Transmission Directorate.Some of my colleagues in the BSE had great positive impact on my career path through their continuous support and ap-preciation of my efforts, including Engineer Saif Al Binali, ex-Director of Water Supply Directorate, Engineer Rasool Mosayeb, ex-Assistant Undersecretary for Planning and Projects, Mr. Jameel Al Alawi, ex-Undersecretary of Min-istry of Electricity and Water and Dr. A. Majeed Al Awadi, Undersecretary of Ministry of Electricity at present. The lat-

BSE board of directors during their visit to the Prime Minister.

In Japan while inspecting the equipment to be imported for Abu Jarjor Desalination Plant.

During training in Ireland.

BSE Board of Directors during their visit to the late Amir.


5

ter played a significant role in guiding me in volunteer work,and he gave me unlimited support to gain training and prac-tical and professional experience.

Are you affiliated to any other societies in addition to BSE? I am a member of the following organizations:

i. Science and Water Technology Association, a GCC or-ganization that is concerned with water in the region. My membership in this society has opened for me vast horizons of knowledge in all matters related to water resources management. During the last six years of my membership on its board of directors, I had the chance to meet with many regional and international charac-ters from whom I gained a lot of experience.

ii. International Desalination Association (IDA), an orga-nization concerned with water desalination issues and encompasses many regional organizations. I currently represent Science and Water Technology Association on the board of IDA and I am the chairman of member affairs in this organization.

How did you start volunteer work, when you joined BSE and what are the committees and board of directors that you took part in them? I was involved in volunteer work since the days I was study-ing in Aleppo when I was a member of the National Union of Bahraini Students. The branch of this union in Aleppo was very active in those days and many unique activities used to be organized in Syria on all spheres. With such activities we managed to win the respect and appreciation of all students including Syrian and Arab students. Through the students union, we learned the concept and importance of volunteer work and its role in promoting the society. Following my graduation and return to Bahrain I continued volunteer work by joining the BSE in 1980 , where I took part in many com-mittees including library committee, Al Muhandis Maga-zine committee and conferences committee. I was on BSE boards during the period 1988-1991 under the chairmanship of Engineer Hesham Al Shehabi and during 1991-1994 un-der the chairmanship of Engineer Emad Al Moayyed, during which I undertook the responsibility of conferences commit-tee. At present, I am a member of the consultation com-

mittee for conferences and a member of BSE Consultation Forum. During my membership on the board, we exerted much efforts during the most difficult period when we weretrying to achieve our goal of building our present premises. I would like to emphasize here that volunteer work has in fact contributed in enhancing the practical, scientific and so-cial expertise of all those who fought for the progress of the BSE. This made us exert our efforts and actively serve the engineering profession and build our community.

How do you see the difference between volunteer work in the past and present and what are the diffi-culties that face the volunteer work in your opinion?

Volunteer work depends on various factors, the most impor-tant of which is to what extent an individual can shoulder responsibility and understand the importance of work and its concepts, and the confidence of members in individualswho carry out the tasks. The active members of BSE are well known with their high sense of responsibility and concepts towards the BSE and its activities. Their efforts have con-tributed effectively in the development of this organization and overcoming all difficulties and promote the BSE as aunique organization that is strongly and actively present in the social and professional fields.Volunteer work depends by its nature on the abilities and efforts of the volunteers and sacrificing their own times toserve this organization. Those early pioneers who founded this organizations and those who came after them to contin-ue the task sit best example and showed us that they had high sense of responsibility while the present generation I think they do not sufficiently appreciate such concepts, and oftenhave excuses about their personal problems and responsi-bilities to escape the volunteer work.

What are the means and ways to attract the new gen-erations to contribute in volunteer work?

It is not easy to attract the new generations to contribute in the volunteer work. The most important reason is the difference in the way of thinking and the gap that exists between the generations particularly on the light of new changes, locally and internationally, which play a significant role in changingthe personality of new engineer and his interests. I think that the political situation stands as an obstacle and prompt the new generation to be more and more concerned with politics than the professional affairs. For this reason, I think the BSE must launch new and variety of progammes in all fields andin modern styles that could attract this generation to be ac-tive in volunteer work and provide them with new qualita-tive concepts that are related to the work and its importance in building and developing our community. Also, the BSE should deeply review its situation in comparison with those systems that are applied in the developed countries which combine the interests of profession with means to attract the new generation. Within this context, the new strategic plans must take into consideration this important issue. Also, the expected transformation of BSE, specifically when it willhave full powers, would indeed help to attract the new engi-neers to join the membership and be active members of BSE. Furthermore, I think in order to motivate the members to be involved in volunteer work, will require granting financialsupport in addition to moral support. This could be achieved

Standing by the registration desk during one of the conferences.


through allocation of a percentage of profit, if any, to rec-ognize the efforts exerted. Also, continuous appreciation and recognition of the efforts exerted by the active working members through meetings specifically held for such pur-pose by the board and honour them with extensive media coverage would undoubtedly encourage them to continue the good work.

Do you face any difficulties in compromis-ing between volunteer work and your duties towards your family or your work? Does ei-ther of them conflict with the other? I don’t think that I face any kind of difficulties. I have man-aged to achieve sort of balance between all my obligations and the volunteer work. I was able to reach to some harmony between them despite my increasing work, responsibilities and obligations without compromising quality. I think in order to maintain balance is to use time management tech-niques, which would help to overcome difficulties and reachto sort of balance in life while maximizing productivity. Through such skills, I managed to give more care to my fam-ily and to have more time to spend for recreational activities with the family and friends.

How do you see the future of BSE upon transformation to a trade union? Transformation of BSE to trade union or to any other entity, would not affect its role particularly that it has managed to obtain its basic requirements that regulate the profession and promote its level in a manner that benefit the engineers andcommunity alike.

Do you find it necessary to transfer the du-ties of Engineering Professions Practice Regulating Board to the trade union? There are some reasons that necessitate the existence of a body that regulate engineering professions in the Kingdom which must be independent and impartial and this body must include qualified people who have enough experience to runthis body and maintain the code of ethics for this profession and comply with the recognized standards. Hence, this body must have strong powers and able to impose laws and obli-gations and on those who practice this profession. Therefore, I think that the tasks of the Engineering Professions Practice

Regulating Board must be represent partnership between the Government and private sectors from one part and the BSE from the other part, so that qualified and experienced mem-bers could be nominated by all these parties together to take part in this board. This board should be competent to lay down the required standards and mechanism for granting permits for practicing the profession, evaluating and qualify individuals, formulate code of ethics standards and follow-ing up the continuous development for those who practice the profession.

Do you think that the strategic plan will con-tribute in the development of the profes-sional performance? The strategic plan is for all and it needs to be activated and continuously updated by benefiting from advanced organi-zational forms. I think that the new plan, particularly the part related to BSE’s obtaining its rights that we have stated earlier, would have significant impact on activating the BSEtasks and giving importance to the membership in the BSE by underlining its role in defending the interest of members, enhancing their scientific and practical capabilities, helpingthem to gain experience in order to promote the BSE role in the community so that it could achieve the required status in the region and worldwide. In conclusion, Mr. Ali Redha expressed his thanks to Al Muhandis Magazine for giving him such an opportunity to speak openly about his visions and the difficulties that facethe volunteer work. He confirmed his belief that BSE willcontinue its progress to benefit both the members and com-munity.

Visit to Italy together with the undersecretary for electricity and water, Dr. A. Majeed Al-Awadhi.

With his children in Europe.

During a picnic with BSE members.


7

To have watched change over a period of half a lifetime is an extraordinary experi-ence. And it would be hard to find a placewhere this was more true than Bahrain. Yet what is particularly fascinating to many of us is that, with all the extraordi-nary, almost unimaginable, changes, there still survive the strengths of the continu-ities - those things in Gulf society that make up its uniqueness, its contribution to human civilization. It seems to me that Bahrain is a wonderful example of how vital those continuities can be in the life of a people. That is what conservation is about in the end. Helping to keep going the continuance of these as-pects of life by rehabilitating the physical framework.

A. The appropriate conserva-tion of buildings has a subti-tle – the poetics of the pastConservation of old buildings is an an-cient idea. The Greeks and Romans be-lieved in it, and we only have the Great Mosque of Cordoba and the Alhambra at Granada because the enlightened emperor Charles V put a stop to their demolition.Exactly what were they trying to pre-serve? The great achievements of their ancestors, and more than that, the great achievements of other cultures than their own.There were four possible techniques that are the focus of argument today: (I have

used the current clarification of the termsin English)

1. Respect for authenticity. i.e., essen-tially “hands off!”

2. Preservation. i.e., doing the mini-mum to retain them for posterity.

3. Conservation. Preserving, but also taking absolutely minimal measures to give an impression of the visual effect they were intended to have originally.

4. Restoration. (a) Putting them back to their original condition – like new, based of irrefutable evidence.i. Or, unfortunately, (b) Putting

them back to an imagined origi-nal condition – including the making of additions of form or decoration for which there is no evidence.

There is another so-called “conservation” approach: Damaging the authenticity of the heritage in the name of restoration – Disastrous Restoration.

1. Hands off!:There is a perfect example: The Parthenon sculptures. When they were on the Parthe-non, the sculptures had been exposed to the weather and warfare for 2,300 years. When they reached the British Museum a crucial decision was taken in 1820 not to repair the damaged surfaces, patch the scars, or replace missing pieces of stone. Not even to clean them, but to respect

the overwhelming importance for artists, scholars, and the public of their “genuine authenticity.”One architectural case in Europe will serve as an example of “hands off” approach – but there are many. Fountains Abbey, Yorkshire, which in spite of the fact that it had survived in a semi-complete condi-tion was kept in its ruined state, follow-ing the arguments of John Ruskin about authenticity and age-value, which I will return to in a moment.

2. Preservation:Recently the British Museum took a deci-sion to preserve the Parthenon sculptures. After 180 years their surfaces were found to have deteriorated due to stone disinte-gration and needed chemical treatment to halt it.The parallel architectural example of preservation as that recently Fountains Abbey was found to have deteriorated, and steps were taken to introduce more maintenances and some protective mea-sures to ensure its preservation.

3. Conservation:At the same time as the Parthenon sculp-tures were being taken down off the buildings for their protection, a pioneer-ing French architect/engineer, Valadier, undertook the conservation of the Arch of Titus in Rome, of which only about half of the building remained. To enable

The Current Crisis In Conservation: Continuity Versus

MonumentalizationBy: Ronald Lewcock

The relationship between monument conservation and urban rehabilitation. The strength of social continuities in the face of overwhelming change. The importance of the physical fabric in sustaining social continuities. The development of urban rehabilitation strategies from conserving small groups of buildings to whole environments. The social economics of continuities linked to the conservation of physical fabrics. The importance of cultural studies in forming conservation and rehabilitation policies. Issues: Perched water tables and building deterioration - necessitating renewed water and sewage systems. Renewal of street paving and litter disposal. Building controls. Methods of providing assistance for building repair and maintenance. Studies of traffic access involve economic issues aswell as those of preserving ambiance. Detailed technical strategies for handling traffic and parking.Tourism and its effects on political decision-making about conservation.


people to enjoy the effect it was originally intended to have, he put back the missing half. But he did this in a particularly skill-ful way. At a distance the Arch looks “all of a piece” (plate 1). But at close quar-ters one can see that the new stones have a specially textured surface to distinguish them – and of course, none of the missing decoration was “restored”Unfortunately this precedent was ignored later in the nineteenth century when it became the practice to disguise the new part as much as possible, creating a ludi-crously pockmarked and diseased effect which completely ruined any advantage in putting back the missing parts.Today we have the advantage of photogra-phy, so that it is not so necessary to distin-guish replaced work from the original on the surfaces themselves – it can be done on a nearby exhibition oh photographs. In this way the Alhambra at Granada and countless other buildings are continually in a state of conservation.

4. Restoration. When it comes to this approach there are really two different extremes.

i. The first goes further than conserva-tion in that enough missing parts of the design are restored to recre-ate the original impression that was intended by the designer – but no more. In this way an existing build-ing which may not mean much to the uninformed observer can be made to speak clearly of symmetry and order which had become disguised with the passage of time. A renais-sance Italian example will serve to illustrate this clearly – Grottaterrata Monastery, Italy, before and after

conservation. (plates 2 & 3)ii. The second type of restoration goes

even further than the first, in at-tempting to restore everything to its original appearance by making additions for which there is no evi-dence.. Many classical sculptures around the world were restored be-fore modern times by having their missing limbs – and sometimes half of their bodies – replaced. Today this practice is frowned upon, and some museums are removing the restorations as much as they can.

Unfortunately the pressure to attract tour-ists is encouraging many governments to-day to replace architectural conservation with this kind of restoration. This is true of, for example, the ex-Soviet republics in Central Asia (plates 4 & 5) and some countries in the Middle East. Frequently there is little or no evidence for the re-placed work – it is pure imagination.At this point I should introduce a fifthcategory – destruction in the name of restoration. A good example of this is the irreparable damage done to the Dome of the Rock by the Egyptian so-called restor-ers in the 1960s (plates 6 & 7). Unfortu-nately this kind of damage is not being adequately guarded against in Yemen to this day.

B. The conservation of towns and cities - appreciating the past and living with it.As in the human body, the life of towns cannot be sustained without their physical skeletons - the buildings, the streets and lanes, and their peculiar conformations together make up "place " that is right for

the sustenance of the crafts and the pat-terns of living that are peculiarly Middle Eastern, Persian, Indian and so on. All my experience suggests that ensuring the con-tinuity of the physical skeleton of towns and cities is important if those essential breathing spirits of visual poetry and cre-ativity in a society are to be kept alive. This is the reason for the importance of urban conservation today in the minds of many people. You can easily see why the endeavours of those of us who have been around for a life time have changed from a concern with monuments to a concern with whole environments. In the 1960s we tended to think that trying to save groups of buildings was an improvement on sav-ing buildings singly. The idea was to try to create an appropriate ambiance around historic buildings, and this idea was still in vogue in the 1970s, so that, working with the United Nations team to advise on a strategy for conserving the Islamic monuments of Bahrain, we agreed to se-lect major groups on which to focus activ-ity, and to try to conserve the whole of the street environment within those zones.1 What was left out of this plan was the life of the people. The essential life-blood of the surviving crafts and the vitality of the old buildings in use. It soon began to be clear to us - partly as a result of public debates in Bahrain on our proposals - that the danger of conserving groups of monu-ments would be almost be same as of conserving individual buildings. It would result in the kind of phenomenon that one found when one traveled through the So-viet countries before glasnost. That is, that the monuments that are saved would tend to be completely empty. As happened, for instance, to the historic mosques and ma-drasahs in Central Asia (Plate 8) and the

Plate 1

Plate 2, Before Conservation. Plate 3, After Conservation.Al-Mohandis - 43December - 2005

9

great monasteries and churches in Mos-cow and St. Petersburg in the 1970s. No-body was allowed to use them. They were preserved as museums, they had become islands of tourism. Even in other countries, where there was no restriction on the use of the monument, it was amazing how often one found that the monument was completely disused. I remember talking to people in the old city of Cairo, when I had got to know very well as the result of working there continuously for eight years - and these were ordinary shop-keepers and dwellers in the old quarter of Gamaliya. When I asked them what they thought about the measures to conserve the old buildings, their reaction was: "The historic build-ings have nothing to do with us, they're for tourists".And the difficulty with historic zones(they still exist in some American cities) - was found to be that they did not work well. Either their effectiveness was slow-ly diminished by the pressures from their inhabitants that they should be treated in the same way as the people in the rest of the central city area, or, at the other ex-treme, the economic life of the historic zones slowly died, because they were too different. So policies changed to the idea of treating the whole of the historic urban core uniformly. "Inner city conservation and rehabilitation" it came to be called. And this policy replaced that of focusing on particular small historic zones. As a re-sult of all these issues, by the time I was asked to work on the UNESCO proposal for the conservation of the old walled city of San’a’ in Yemen, in the early '80's, I became an advocate to the government of the position that it was necessary to avoid creating, in each old city, a series of muse-ums. And for this reason, I felt the need to stress the life of the community as being the key issue - more central to any strategy of urban conservation than the exact fate of individual buildings (although clearly there are a few exceptions to that - where

the buildings are ranked as national trea-sures). On the whole it seemed that the re-viving life of communities was what was really important, bringing with it all the concomitant effects on the prosperity and continuity of built environments - includ-ing the historic monuments.2 So framing conservation and rehabilitation strategies had as its first step undertaking detailedsociological and cultural studies of the community.The campaigns that succeeded have re-flected political will at the highest level.(In Yemen, the campaign to rehabilitate San’a’ had the blessing of the Presi-dent, and at the request of UNESCO, the Prime Minister set up a Board of Trust-ees composed of Ministers of his cabinet to control it. A similar structure, which was being considered for Cairo, did not eventuate after the assassination of Anwar Sadat, who was actively involved in pro-moting it.)Successful campaigns have succeeded in centralizing efforts, and by corollary, they have been able to avoid the dissipation of effort that comes from contests between ministries or departments over decision-making and power, and similar competi-tions between NGOs.In the World Bank proposals for San’a’, a special agency was set up under a Se-lect Committee of Ministers to carry out the rehabilitation of the old city. Its task was described as being the rehabilitation of the physical resources of the city, while paying respect to issues of conserving the historic fabric with the aim of providing sympathetic and appropriate development of the built environment. This was to have been paralleled by the rehabilitation of private industries and business using cu-mulative small loans from one of more “Grameen”-type banks, although this was slow to develop.In order to emphasize the participatory role of all of these activities it was felt to be important to set up the headquar-ters of the rehabilitation campaign in the

center of the old city, where it would be well positioned to play a negotiating and advisory role, as well as acting as an eas-ily accessible technical resource for the inhabitants.Historic city conservation had many ad-vantages. Not least being the opportunity it provided for systematic consideration of the relationship between the historic core and the rest of the city. But this car-ries with it the need for the development of global planning policies at an eco-nomic and physical level for the whole city to make the retention the central area viable. Inner city conservation and re-habilitation has two important ramifica-tions: A. The number of buildings and enterprises which could not be rated as of primary historic importance as contribut-ing to the general character or ambiance rose enormously. It became impractical to consider conserving and renovating all these at public expense. So a system had to be introduced which is part grants, part loans in aid, the latter supported by a loan bank. The necessity of setting up this bank has the additional advantage that it could provide loans to finance small busi-nesses which would retain traditional or appropriate activities in the historic city centre. B. The need to find the money tofund the greatly increased burden of ur-ban conservation and rehabilitation of the historic areas has increasingly become the justification for governments focusing allconservation efforts on tourism. Some po-litical leaders greedily eye the huge profitsbeing made everywhere from tourism and see conservation as a means of swelling their national coffers. Tourism has conse-quently begun to take on a power of its own, dictating policies for the historic cit-ies which have in the last fourteen years begun to take precedence over the initial concern to preserve for future generations the genuine relics of the past in built form and urban environments. Now the prior-ity has begun to be to make the historic centre as attractive to the tourists as pos-sible - with no holds barred on the extent

Plate 5, After Restoration.Plate 4, Before Restoration.


of imaginary reconstruction to achieve a good effect - and as profitable as pos-sible, with no holds barred on the destruc-tion of the original environment in order to replace it with innovative commercial activities, and with tourist restaurants and hotels. The indigenous town dwellers, tradesmen and craftsmen, carrying with them the original life and vitality of the place, are being banished - perhaps to dis-appear for ver - and their place are being taken by phonies. The integrity of value of the historic centre is thus often de-stroyed, and with it most of the authentic evidence of the architecture and urbanism of preceding ages. Such is the commercial power of tourism. It is as though com-mercial profitability - and the principlesof Disneyland - are being propagated ev-erywhere to replace integrity and reality. All this has contributed to making the conservation and rehabilitation of historic towns an extraordinarily difficult prob-lem. Finally, the situation of conservation is complicated by another factor. This is the inferiority felt by some countries about modernization. This has led then to add a political agenda to their economic agenda. The cultural value of preserving the old cities of the benefit of future gen-erations of their own people is regarded as of no consequence. Instead the activity of rehabilitation is an opportunity to replace old buildings by new ones constructed using concrete and modern technology in the form and some of the dress of the old. And thus they legitimate not only the demolition and complete rebuilding of priceless historic monuments, but also the destruction of the ambient buildings, in-cluding historic neighboring and secular public buildings such as markets, schools and public baths. In many countries this is the stage that urban conservation and rehabilitation has reached. A whole new range of issues exists to be tackled. The task of those concerned is now to devise strategies to deal with them.

C. Summary of Changing Attitudes to Urban Conser-vation and Rehabilitation in the Second Half of the Twentieth Century. The conservation of a historic city would only be possible if one took account of the problem of the motor car and of car access for the tourists. It was important to avoid tourists' cars, and particularly tourists' buses, interfering with two things: firstly,the functioning of the city, and secondly, the normal life and ambiance of the his-toric area. It has also become necessary to consider the conflicting needs of "traf-

fic facilitating" versus "traffic calming".The former was appropriate for trafficaround (that is, for ring roads and perim-eter roads), the latter for traffic within theold city centre.Traffic calming seems an appropriatestrategy within most of the old towns and cities of the Middle East.Principles :

1. That the mixing of pedestrian and traffic is unavoidable in old cities.

2. That the mixing is hardest on pedes-trians unless certain restraints can be achieved:a. The traffic is slow moving : +/-

15mph.b. The traffic moves in one direc-

tion only , i.e. one way streets as much as possible.

c. the traffic is not allowed to parkand block streets.

Comparison of techniques for handling vehicular traffic mixed with pedestrians:

1. C.G.Argan's strategy for handling traffic in the old towns and cities ofItaly in the 1930's proved to work well for large vehicles, but was not as effective for dealing with the nui-sance created by small vehicles and motorcycles.

2. The use of humps ("Sleeping po-liceman"), undulating and rough road surfaces to slow traffic, haveproved especially effective for small vehicles and motorcycles - but not as efficient for dealing withlarge vehicles.

3. Zones in which both actions 1 and 2 were combined were the strategies often employed in old cities in the 1980's. But they have not always proved popular with pedestrians.

4. Contemporary traffic and parkingcontrol systems:a. In old areas, the deliberate nar-

rowing of passage-ways for vehicles at regular intervals to

force them to slow to a walking pace: this completely prevents the access of large vehicles on a permanent basis, so that alterna-tive round-about routes have to be provided for them.

b. The introduction of physical zoning systems, by creating "no-go" areas for all but emergency vehicles—except at certain times. Retractable booms or bol-lards are used to effect the clos-ing off of access (Plate 9). Bol-lards are thought to be preferable since they don't affect pedestrian movement. Once they are raised, the bollards prevent all vehi-cles except motorcycles going through, and even cycles have to be wheeled through them. An advantage of this system is that the bollards can be hydraulically lowered out of the way to permit the closed zones to be changed into zones of free access during certain hours of the day. Simi-larly, they can be lowered at any time during "no-go" periods by the driver of an emergency or police vehicle passing a small card carrying a magnetic stripe through a monitoring device at the side of the road.

c. Zones open only to vehicles li-censed to enter them at certain times of the day and night. The licenses are of distinctive col-ors, prominently displayed in the front windows of the vehicles. Considerable police surveillance and heavy fines are necessary toensure that the system works.

d. Zones in which no stopping and no parking is permitted. Again, these function satisfactorily only if there is a large and efficient

Plate 6, Before Restoration. Plate 7, After Restoration.Al-Mohandis - 43December - 2005

police force to enforce the pay-ment of parking fines. In old

e. towns of narrow streets and dif-ficult circulation, it may provean effective zoning system to concentrate on restricting all stopping and parking in the cen-tral areas. In which case, special parking areas would have to be provided which do not interfere with the life and character of the old towns. Anyone parking any-where else would be fined.

f. The best solutions may lie in a combination of these strategies: The provision of no-stopping and no-parking zones in cer-tain areas during specific hoursof the day, with "no-go" zones controlled by retractable bol-lards in areas of highest pedes-trian density, and the provision of hidden parking areas that can be accessed directly from ring roads to serve (a) residents and (b) those desiring access to zones during the hours when they are closed and restricted to traffic.In areas of maximum restriction deliveries and transport of goods would take place when markets and shops are closed.

Specific suitability to Middle Eastern cit-ies and towns:Provided that a happy bal-ance between traffic diminution and accesscan be achieved, the results of all this are anticipated to be that the economic life in the towns and cities will be strengthened; and that in itself should supply a support structure to assist the conservation of the environment and the major monuments.3

To summarize:a. Should access be facilitated? (In

the Italian cities the answer was no

- also true of decisions taken in his-toric Flemish and Dutch cities).

b. Should tourist cars be prevented from entering the historic zone? Generally yes, especially where large buses are concerned. How do you discriminate between them and delivery vehicles? The answer is: by time zoning access, so that de-liveries take place in the evenings or early mornings.

c. Where are tourist vehicles allowed access and parking? On the periph-ery. Large delivery vehicles are also permitted access and parking on the periphery at any time, and this would allow the shipment of goods further into the city. (The design of peripheral parking itself introduces new problems. It would not be de-sirable for the old city to become surrounded by a continuous zone of parking. So some sort of a system of radial parking - rather like the spokes of a wheel - has to be in-volved. This in turn raises the diffi-cult issue of how the entrances into the historic city are to be handled visually and physically.)

d. Traffic restrictions have to be intro-duced in the historic zone, and this is done physically, by narrowing access points. Where flexibility isdesired, this narrowing is achieved by hydraulic bollards.

There are three other issues involved in urban conservation that I would like to briefly touch on:

Perched Water Tables4

In the early 1980s there was one threat to life in the old cities that was usually found so serious that is had to be dealt with at once, this was that houses were collapsing

as their foundations became water-logged (Plate 10).

Any program for conserving the life of old cities had to include the installation of new water supply and sewerage pipes which would be adequate for decent life in the old cities. And, for the sake of ef-ficiency, this had to be done at the sametime as the street paving was replaced.5

Conservation of HousesFinally there is the problem of making al-lowances for changes in the houses.How does one protect the character of the old architecture of the towns while allow-ing the owners to modernize their life and adapt their houses as they do so?

This problem has been tackled for more than 50 years in old towns in Europe. I myself live in such a protected house. What it generally means is that those facades on the streets, or those clearly visible from afar, cannot – by law – be changed. Whereas all other facades can – new windows and even extensions can be added.

Internally, my house, and many thousands like it, can be changed as much as I or the other owners wish. The only houses that have protected interiors are those listed and legally enforced – usually they become museums open to the public, no more than one in a thousand on average.

To some extent, these policies are extend-ed to public buildings. Each case is taken on its merits, and a permit to do certain alterations may be issued by trained con-servators in consultation with the local authority.

Building Control One factor that the campaigns have gener-ally been unable to resolve satisfactorily is control of new building, which needs not to be discouraged - for balanced growth and improvement are judged essential for the healthy life of the old cities - but simply monitored and kept under some control. The reason this has not happened is directly lack of enabling legislation and inspectors to enforce it from the govern-ments. There a number of types of serious violations which continue to be matters of major concern:

a. Building additions exceeding the height of the highest buildings and the minarets near them.

b. Encroachment of new buildings into open spaces, market gardens and cemeteries.

c. Buildings changing function. Espe-cially houses in residential areas be-ing converted for commercial use.

Plate 8


Another aspect of the campaigns of ur-ban rehabilitation that has proved dif-ficult to resolve was that many of theprivate buildings were not being ade-quately maintained and repaired. To help establish a dialogue between the owners and the offices of the campaigns, a sys-tem of loans (and in some cases grants) was proposed. And for this purpose loan banks had to be set up. This has generally been considered in the all the campaigns of urban conservation, but few have yet been implemented. The subsidized loans and grants were also intended to allow the rehabilitation and modernization of the houses to suit the developing life styles and needs of their inhabitants. Although loan banks for this purpose and to support the development of small businesses have been considered at the highest levels they have usually failed to receive backing from conservative economists and politi-cians, in spite of considerable evidence from Asian experiments that small scale loans have proved viable and secure. The quality of work executed under such a system would, of course, need to be su-pervised by the campaign offices.6

Another central issue in rehabilitation is the economic strengthening of the com-munity of the old city centre. Although means of doing this vary enormously, most old cities share certain traditional structures for industry - the skilled work-ers, craftsmen and tradesmen, and the distributors in markets and warehous-ing. Careful studies of means of avoid-ing economic deterioration and provid-ing incentives have underscored the need for the government controls (of the right kind) and government intervention to provide catalysts for economic improve-ment. Without government attention to the special needs of the old central cities, in order to achieve economic strength, it is unlikely that any rehabilitation project

will succeed.

If historic buildings and the urban envi-ronment are worth conserving at all, the historic aspect must not be lost in the pro-cess of repair, or the whole operation be-comes a travesty.7 That is, in the so-called restoration of buildings the authenticity of all the materials and surfaces has to be re-tained, and new work restrained to an ab-solute minimum. And in urban rehabilita-tion, the historic character of the city must not be lost, even if that means restraining the ease of access and parking to some ex-tent, and making people walk a few yards more from hidden parking places. Most important - to summarize what has been said before - one of the severe threats from government sponsorship of tourism is the danger that they should direct that their monuments be "renewed" to look fresh and immaculate - and even given more colour and decoration than they originally had - in the belief that this is necessary to appeal to the great mass of tourists whose lavish spending is expected to fill national

coffers.8 If this should be allowed to hap-pen, future generations will no longer have access to a sense of the quality of the architecture and urban environments of the past. Instead they will be presented with invented visual images - new kinds of "virtual reality".

References:1. Ronald Lewcock. "Conservation in Islamic Cairo"

and "The Conservation of the Old City of Cairo" in The Expanding Metropolis (Geneva, Aga Khan Award, 1985).

2. R.B. Lewcock. "The Campaign to Preserve the Old city of San'a'" (Paris, UNESCO, 1982), and 8 sub-sequent Reports.

3. World Bank Proposal for the Gamaliya District, 1981-84. Discussed in "The Rehabilitation and upgrading of Historic Cairo" in The Expanding Metropolis (Geneva Aga Khan Award, 1985). R.B. Lewcock. "Conservation in Islamic Cairo" op. cit.

4. R.B. Lewcock. "The Problem of Subterranean Wa-ter in the Old Urban Areas of Arab Cities" in Se-rageldin, ed. "The Arab City" (Riyadh, 1982). R.B. Lewcock. "The Old City of Sana" in "Development and Urban Metamorphosis" (Geneva, Aga Khan Award, 1983). R.B. Lewcock. "The Old Walled City of San'a'" (Paris, UNESCO, 1986).

5. R.B. Lewcock. "The Technical Problems of Urban Rehabilitation and Upgrading" in Designing in Islamic Cultures 3, (Cambridge, Mass, MIT, Aga Khan Seminar, 1983). R.B. Lewcock. "Introduc-tion" in San'a' Michael Barry Lane, ed, (Paris, UNDP-UNESCO, 1986). Diana Petheridge. "Sav-ing the Historic City of Sana''" in "The Financial Times" (London, 10 October 1987).

6. The important model of the Grameen Bank in Ban-gladesh, and the many types of loan banks which it has sponsored, is discussed in "Grameen Bank Housing Programme" in "Architecture for Islamic Societies Today" (ed. James Steel, Geneva Aga Khan Award, 1994) p 60-71.

7. R.B. Lewcock. "Preservation versus Modernization" in The Challenge of Our Cultural Heritage. (Paris, UNESCO, 1986).

8. Ronald Lewcock. Consultant Reports on Conser-vation as Cultural and Economic Development in Uzbekistan. (Paris, United Nations Reports, UNES-CO for UNDP, 1992-6). Ronald Lewcock (ed. with M.B.Lane) Exhibition Catalogue: Reviving the Silk Road - Cultural Tourism and the National Heritage of Uzbekistan, ( Paris and Tashkent, UN/UNESCO, 1996).

Plate 9

Plate 10Al-Mohandis - 43December - 2005

Towards Development and Enhancement of Engineering Education

By: Dr. Baghdad Benstaali and Dr. Maamar Taleb

The noble mission of the university as an educational institution is to contribute to the development of a nation by produc-ing skilled personnel such as engineering, health doctors, economists, lawyers, lin-guists and high-level administrative per-sonnel for the state needs. With well-con-ceived educational programs, which were set in the past twentieth century, the uni-versity is in a position to foresee urgent society demands, economical requests and regional and international trends in order to reorganise and actualise its educational programs for the future. A rapid evolu-tion of the economical growth with an outburst in the development of the infor-mation technology may lead to anticipate the eventual difficulties facing the labourmarket. The best way to predict future de-velopment of any society is to study the parameters, which characterize it, analyse them and understand what is happening at the present time. So tomorrow’s world could be predicted and planned today. A good initiative from the University of Bahrain College of Engineering in this regard was to organise a symposium1 on the “Development and Enhancement of Engineering Education”.

Symposium objectivesThe organizers objectives are clear: gath-ering all people contributing to the engi-neering education in order to evaluate, confront their point of views, expose their experiences, and finally emerge with newideas and recommendations. The college concerns are essentially the evaluation of its teaching capacities by weighing-up the engineering alumna tasks at work, their efficiency and weaknesses in order to seeif they fulfil the industries’ requirements.The teaching methods and curriculum coverage mainly concern the faculties’ staffs whose high experience, capabili-ties, enthusiasm for teaching, attention to students and efforts to use modern teach-ing techniques were praised2. The learn-ing procedures that are gauged by finalexaminations, frequent tests, home works, quizzes now and then, laboratory reports and projects usually estimate the level of knowledge transfer and acquisition. The students’ representatives, who are the

central actors in the evaluation processes, are selected from the brightest assiduous undergraduates still involved in the learn-ing process. Most of the local industrial partners, former University of Bahrain graduates, stand for the local industries. As experienced candidates at work, they can be the adequate instruments in evalu-ating the standard of technical, know-how and communication skills acquired during the study period and that expected by the labour market, for the college3. The labour market holds as well data for future eco-nomical growth, which may help in the regulation of students flow at the orienta-tion period. The selection of a student’s option could be partly dependant on it, which consequently helps in the decrease of jobless. So the local industrial partners feedbacks, criticisms, recommendations and contributions in this very important evaluation phase are incontestable.

Contributions and resultsThe scientific community namely thefaculties’ staff were debating the results of the evaluation of the engineering pro-grams with a widespread background of its invited speakers from USA, neigh-bouring Gulf states universities, indus-trial partners and students. A world expert speaker4 in engineering education quality highlighted and emphasized on the vari-ous trends namely economical difficulties,technological development, brain-drain mobility and social imperatives facing the industrial world. Others5 were more concerned by confirming the standard oftheir educational programs by meeting some criteria in order to satisfy ABET (Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology) accreditation. An analysis of the strength, weaknesses, opportuni-ties and threats6 of an educational system is essential in order to organise efficientstrategic planning at university level. The survey carried out by the engineer-ing faculty’ staff7 on random engineering students of various departments by using close and open-ended answers question-naires reflects in general, the non-negli-gible level of non-satisfaction of students with some survey’s items (encourage-ment to use computers, absence of active

learning and teaching enthusiasm, stimu-lation in course). The analysis of the sur-vey’s results is more disappointing with the mathematic courses contents and the sub-standard level in English as the main language of communication used in the learning procedure. The students are natu-rally complaining from the lack of books and references in the library shelves, the absence of practical laboratory sessions, the traditional faculties teaching meth-ods and insufficient industrial training.They are somehow not ignoring the im-portance of local industries contribution in their formation process. The industrial representatives stressed more in their oral contributions on large deficiencies of theuniversity graduates during their proba-tion period. While most of them recognise that engineering graduates acquire a solid theoretical background in engineering principles, lack of practical hands-on and technical skills is widely reported by the Bahrain Ministry of Electricity and Water and further training then becomes neces-sary to take responsibilities8. The Bahrain Petroleum Company shows satisfaction with the university alumna and is more concerned by the development of curricu-la in order to meet future industry needs9. They know they are fully dependent on the university outputs and very sensitive to the students’ option choices. A previ-ous decision of the university to close some engineering specialities (chemi-cal) alarmed the petroleum company and urged the university for close meeting and collaborations in order to rapidly take ap-propriate decisions.

Speakers’ Recommendations

As local companies have been exposing their valuable opinions and views on the university outputs, they represent the best feedback in the evaluation procedure of the college graduates. They ought to be non-negligible partners and more im-plicated in future educational decisions. They are asking for changes, ameliora-tions and to be involved in teaching some courses in the curricula10. Others11 want to establish stronger collaborations with the university, which is an encouraging idea. Research committees and alliances12


between the university and industries are also another alternative, which were men-tioned. Some of them went even further by proposing sponsoring students dur-ing the learning period but that is meant only to secure the output of engineering graduates in specific qualifications. Otherrecommendations on introducing courses on management and economics should give the graduates a theoretical basis in order to prepare them for administrative responsibilities in the industry.

The students’ desertion from the engi-neering education in the United States was mainly pedagogical since engineer-ing students were complaining about the absence of engineering courses since the first year of their studies. The low-levelof our engineering students in purely fun-damental mathematics courses has been noted and the changes in the courses con-tents to statistics and numerical methods currently used in industrial applications may improve their values. The sub-stan-dard of the English language as an es-sential means of communication in the teaching-learning procedure has to be im-proved and elevated to the university stan-dard by radical changes in the secondary education13. So the positive contributions from the college’s staff, students and in-dustrial partners are significant and showtheir deep concern in future changes and reforms in the engineering educational curricula.

Discussions and CommentsIn order to live in harmony with its local en-vironment, the normal university attitude is to react accordingly to their demands, which could be met, without deviating from its noble mission as an educational institution. If the English and mathemat-ics courses have been incriminated for the difficulties facing our students to followtheir contents, the other courses content also have to be re-examined. One sum-mer training session during the B.Sc. program is not consistent and additional sessions are desirable. The successful ex-perience of the Algerian petroleum com-pany (SONATRACH) is undeniable in the sense that it created its own institute (Algerian Petroleum Institute) in order to meet its human recruitment policies by forming high standard skilled engineers and technicians for petroleum fields, refin-eries and other derivative plants (plastics, resin, lubricant…). The institution was doted with up-to-date teaching laboratory mastered by skilled foreign and local fac-ulty staff. Industrial training in petroleum fields was intense and the periods weremore frequent. They spend fixed training

periods each year so the graduates’ tech-nical skills are very high. Its graduates’ experience in the petroleum industries made them more attracted in the inter-national job market (Gulf states, Africa, Venezuela). The English course content as the official language of communica-tion should emphasise more on scientificsubjects rather than Shakespearian topics. The ability for an engineer graduate to write in English, an understandable scien-tific report and makes a clear analysis ofthe results obtained through his practical work, laboratory demonstration or indus-trial plant visits is far more than accept-able. Non-traditional teaching methods (active learning, presentations, comput-ers, data show, slides…) should be used in order to stimulate enthusiasm for students learning. Evaluation techniques ought to be up-dated and varied in order to have an objective evaluation. On the other hand, students ought to be more active in learn-ing. Most of them rely on vocal learning that is to my sense insufficient while tak-ing notes and referring to them stay the best method of completing the learning process. Keenness in referring to modern technical methods of learning such as the internet to diversify the scope of the refer-ences is generalised among students but it should be emphasised that the library stays the essential tool of completing the knowledge. That does not mean that in-ternet could not be wisely used to com-plete and improve the student knowledge when actualised information on different scientific topics or industrial processes isneeded. Encouraging the students to be more cooperative in the learning process will certainly keep the students’ standard higher and spare them away from being qualified as “spoon-fed “ students.

The industry collaboration with the uni-versity should not be only kept to the students’ evaluation level but be more im-plicated in the learning process. Sponsor-ing students during their studies wont to my sense motivate the selected students. We notice that most of them are worried about their grades that qualify them and higher their chances during the job-hunt-ing period. So less enthusiasm in learning will be showed if a job is already waiting for them. But the industry’s contribution to the college in increasing the students’ standard will be more effective if it af-fects the teaching-learning processes. The industrial partners are more aware that in order to enhance the quality of a product they have to act at different levels of their manufacturing process (quality of input, measuring devices, reagents, process of fabrication and so on). The vital partner involved is the faculties’ staff and its con-tribution to learning could be enhanced

by well-equipped teaching laboratories that could be provided by the industry. Furthermore a wide collaboration with the universities’ staff could be established by common research projects related to the industries problems and future de-velopment. That could be confirmed bypostgraduate research topics related to the industry problems leading to M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees. Both partners will be satis-fied: the university will form its own stafffor future needs and the universities’ staff will gain expertise in the field. On the oth-er hand, the industry finds solutions to itstechnical problems that lead to improve the quality’s products and outputs by cheaper ways. The growth of any industry is founded on its capacities to develop its manufacturing process. The industry has always been considering that information related to their manufacturing process as a private matter. No one could decline the close collaboration between the universi-ties and industries in the United States, which is the reason of its success.

Conclusion Precious information related to various factors affecting the engineering educa-tional system has been collected during the symposium, which could be studied carefully in order to enhance engineering education. The university is doing its best to satisfy the industrial partners but the latter also needs to play an effective and concerted role in improving the teaching-learning methods and techniques that en-able the university of Bahrain to satisfy its local industrial partners and consequently confirm its regional and international uni-versity standard.

References:1. Held in the Manama Conferences Center during

24-25 February 2004.2. Dr H. Madani, Dean of the college of engineer-

ing at University of Bahrain.3. Eng. K. M. El-Rayes, BAFCO.4. Pr. Russell Jones, Expert consultant on

engineering education, USA.5. Pr. A. H. Zahed, King Addulaziz University

and Dr S. Al-Baiyat, King Fahd University of Petroleum and Engineering.

6. Pr. A. Yigit, College of Engineering and Petroleum, Kuwait University.

7. Pr. M. Akbaba, Pr. S. Suliman, Pr. E. El-Kanzi, Dr H. Al-Madani, Dr D. Al-Samahiji, University of Bahrain.

8. Dr. J. S. K. Al-Alawi, Bahrain Electricity and Water.

9. Mr M. Moradi, Bahrain Petroleum Company.10. Dr H. Mahmood, Ministry of Electricity and

Water.11. Eng. D. A. Tawfeeqi, Bahrain Society of

Engineers and A. R. Jawahiri, GPIC, 12. Eng. A. M. Mohammadi, ASRY company.13. H. S. Mubarak, Head of technical secondary

school, Ministry of Education.


Intercontinental negotiation phase

In the intercontinental negotiation phase, the dissertation will describe how the techno-democratic leader can formulize a global strategy of transfer technology, and facilitate the contracting related to technology transfer agreements among industrial and developing countries. In this research area, Schurr and Fischer (1996) wrote that the success of market-entry and market-development strate-gies should use technology transfer con-cepts, which technology transfer theory explains a market’s capacity to absorb a new product. Thus, Schurr and Fischer (1996) propose that technology transfer concepts will help marketers interpret mixed signals in developing markets of Eastern Europe and help them plan bet-ter marketing strategies, while Schrank (2004) wrote about the relationship between generality of the commodity-chain approach and technology trans-fer concept, which Schrank (2004) broached several discussion points when illuminated a parallel process of skill and technology transfer in the Caribbean Basin thereby underscoring the general-ity of the commodity-chain approach to supply-chain integration ,and calling the benefits of integration into question. Al-though the techno-democratic leadership should formalize the global strategy of technology transfer, the strategy should ensure the appropriability of technology

innovations. The means of appropriation are the mechanisms that firms use to pro-tect their innovation against imitation by their competitors (Nieto & Cano, 2004). The mechanism of appropriability can be classified into four categories. First,an agreement on trade related aspects of intellectual property rights; second, an agreement on trade related invest-ment measures; third, a general agree-ment on trade in services, and, fourth, an agreement on technical barriers to trade (UNIDO, 1996). One of responsibilities of techno-democratic leadership is to construct E-globalism and digital world, so this leadership certainly protects a digital environment through legal, tech-nological and contractual approaches. The legal approach is a process that modifies copyright laws to an adaptableand practical context. Technological ap-proach is a system that controls of the access and the use of digital works while contractual approach is licenses regulate the conditions and the use of the digital works (Fernandez-Molina, 2004).

International complementarity phase

The dissertation in this phase will de-scribe how the techno-democratic lead-ership can achieve a global system of innovation by establishing a globaliza-tion council. Archibugi & Coco (2001) suggested something similar by their

suggestion to establish a council that in-cludes European countries concerns of the international exploitation of nation-ally produced innovations, the global generation of innovations, and the glob-al technological and scientific collabo-rations. The globalization council has a similar objective, but it will represent all countries of world. The responsibili-ties of this council are the comprehen-sive audit of technological innovation, the strategic audit of organizational quality, and the continual regulation of environmental consciousness. These re-sponsibilities can lead organizations and governments to align innovation with the global strategy; create disciplined in-novation processes; create an innovation and total quality culture; build innova-tion support infrastructures; measure in-novation; ensure mutual benefit amongagreements’ parties; and design an ecol-ogy-based production system (Cleve-land, 2004; Kartha, 2002; & Blanchard, 1998). The dissertation will research how the globalization council can attain the objective and how this council can enhance humanity lifestyles and guide organizations to innovate best technol-ogy, support governments to achieve optimal performance, and overcome the environmental consequences of a prod-uct or process over its entire life from raw material acquisition to final dispos-al. These questions lead the dissertation to consider relationship between inno-

Techno-Democratic Leadership

Eng. Sadeq AlAbdulwahab

BSc In Electrical Engineering -UOBMSc In Engineering Management-UOB

The topic of AlAbdulwahab’s dissertation will concern of an emerging new model of leadership which is techno-democratic. Techno-democratic is a combination of technological and democratic leaderships. Techno-democratic leadership is a behavior can predict change of technology and construct dimensions of social relationships according to the variables. The dissertation will tend to synthesize an implementation strategy of the techno-democratic model. This strategy endeavors to transform the sys-tem or process of the innovation from organizational level to global level through four phases: intercontinental negotiation, international comple-mentarity, virtual globalization, and objective globalization. Each phase has a number of problems that can be addressed in doctoral study.


vation and employment by improving methods and tools of technology selec-tion and forecasting. Castellacci et al (2005) mentioned that unemployment is currently an important concern for poli-cy makers in many middle-income and more advanced countries. The complex relationships among technology, growth, and employment emerge new phenom-ena such as jobless growth and techno-logical unemployment. The technologi-cal change has an immediate negative effect on the demand for labor because firms need to employ fewer workers toproduce the same amount of output. In this respect, the dissertation endeavor to solve important questions are posed by Castellacci. These questions: what are the effects of innovation on the quality of employment, in terms of changes in skills, competencies, and wage structure? What are the effects, more generally, on the distribution of income? What are the implications in terms of environmental and social sustainability? And what are the implications of these evolutionary theories of innovation and growth for the understanding of the employment performance of different countries?

Virtual globalization phase

The dissertation in this phase will con-ceptualize E-globalism and construct a model to integrate E-globalism compo-nents such as E-democracy, E-commerce, and E-learning, and Geographical Infor-mation System (GIS). E-globalism is a scheme that connects all governments, societies, and organizations via Internet, Intranet and Extranet to ultimately make a global activation of all components of E-globalism model. Watson & Mundy (2001) denoted that the goal of E-democ-racy is to deploy information technology to improve the effectiveness and effi-ciency of democracy. Watson & Mundy (2001) also mentioned that e-democracy includes two elements are e-government and e-politics, and E-democracy can be implemented via strategy includes three stages is initiation, infusion, and custom-ization. Schiavetta (2004) denoted that States should have electronic-Alternative Dispute Resolution (e-ADR). The con-cept of Alternative Dispute Resolution covers a range of procedures like media-tion, arbitration, adjudication, med-arb, ombudsmen, early-neutral evaluations, and complaint assistance, and Alterna-tive Dispute Resolution procedures are methods for resolving disputes that do not involve going to court. E-commerce is other important component in E-glo-

balism, and supply chine is major sup-port to e-commerce application (Turban, 2002). Siau & Tian (2004) wrote that the goal of supply chain integration is to link up the marketplace, the distribution network, the manufacturing process, and the procurement activity in such a way that customers are better serviced at a lower total cost. The third compo-nent of E-globalism is E-learning. Tham & Werner (2005) wrote that “We have argued that it is imperative that institu-tional, technological, and student issues be addressed simultaneously. Successful online learning is unlikely to occur if any of these factors receive inadequate attention. The potential for successful learning and transfer from online educa-tion is evident” (p. 25).

Objective Globalization Phase

The dissertation in this phase will emerge an. The objective globalization is a scheme regulates international comple-mentarity and systemized global system of innovation under the rule of techno-logical jurisprudence. The technological jurisprudence is scientific reference thatincludes core principles, main guide-lines, important laws, and general con-cepts of Human-Technology relation-ship. The dissertation will synthesize a procedure to methodize technological jurisprudence on two axis are human and technology with multiple dimensions such as moral values, natural recourses, international complementarity, and en-vironmental equilibrium. The scientificmethod of technological jurisprudence should depend on approval and recent researches of ethics, law, management, and engineering. The purpose of this jurisprudence is to ensure human moral-ity, continual development, professional equity, environmental equilibrium, and optimal lifestyle to all countries around the world. Aggarwal (1999) wrote that “we are now living in an age of general-ized progress characterized by major ad-vances in technology and globalization. Technology facilitates globalization and globalization makes technology more profitable and accelerates technologi-cal advances. Business is becoming less hierarchical, faces shorter product life cycles, industrial restructuring based on deconstructed value chains, new com-petitors from unexpected sources and countries, virtual corporations, and an era of significantly greater degree of glo-balization” (p. 102). Aggarwal’s ideas provoke thought to a need of technology jurisprudence to reduce the uncertainty

or the ambiguity of globalization effects, and to ensure the healthy environment in global market.

Conclusion

The paper introduced techno-democratic leadership as topic to the author’s disser-tation. The author’s dissertation attempts to synthesize an implementation strategy of this leadership. The strategy includes four phases are an intercontinental nego-tiation, an international complementar-ity, a virtual globalization, and an objec-tive globalization. The purpose of the implementation strategy is to transform the system of innovation from an organi-zational level to a global level, while the problem research in this dissertation will be how the techno-democratic leadership can format a global strategy of the tech-nology transfer, achieve a global system of innovation, establish a globalization council, conceptualize E-globalism, and methodize technological jurisprudence?

References• Aggarwal, R. (1999). Technology and globalization as

mutual reinforces in business: Reorienting strategic thinking for the new millennium. Management Inter-national Review, 39, 105.

• Tham, C.; & Werner, J. (2005). Designing and evalu-ating E-learning in higher education: A review and recommendations. Journal of Leadership & Organi-zational Studies, 11(2), 26.

• Turban, E.; & Mclean. (2002). Information technology for management (3rd Ed.). New York: John Wiley & Sons, INC.

• Siau, K., & Tian, Y. (2004). Supply chains integration: Architecture and enabling technologies. The Journal of Computer Information Systems, 44(3), 67-73.

• Schiavetta, S. (2004). The relationship between e-ADR and article 6 of the European convention of human rights pursuant to the case law of the European court of human rights. Law Technology, 37(4), 1-63.

• Watson, R., & Mundy, B. (2001). A strategic perspec-tive of electronic democracy. Association for Comput-ing Machinery, 44(1), 27-30.

• Castellacci, F.; Grodal, S.; Mendonca, S. ; & Wibe, M. (2005). Advances and challenges in innovation stud-ies. Journal of Economic Issues, 39(1), 122.

• Blanchard, B.; & Fabrycky. (1998). System engineer-ing and analysis (3rd Ed.). USA: Prentice-Hall, Inc. (Original work published 1981)

• Kartha, C. (2002). ISO9000:2000 quality management systems standards: TQM focus in the new revision. Journal of American Academy of Business, 2(1), 1-6.

• Cleveland, J. (2004). A suppliers’ guide to innovation. Automotive Design & Production, 116(11), 18-21.

• Archibugi, D. ; & Coco, A. (2001). The technological performance of Europe in a global setting. Industry and Innovation, 8(3), 245-269.

• Fernandez-Molina, J. (2004). Contractual and techno-logical approaches for protecting digital works: Their relationship with copyright limitations. Online Infor-mation Review, 28(2), 148-160.

• Nieto, M.; & Cano, C. (2004). The influence of Knowl-edge attributes on innovation protection mechanisms. Knowledge and Process Management, 11(2), 117-126.

• UNIDO. (1996). Manual on technology transfer nego-tiation. Austria: UNIDO Publications.

• Schrank, A. (2004). Ready-to-Wear Development? Foreign Investment, technology transfer, and learn-ing by watching in the apparel trade. Social Forces, 83(1), 123-157.

• Schurr, P., & Fischer, H. (1996). Marketing as technol-ogy transfer in developing European markets. Journal of Euro-Marketing, 5(1), 83-99.


Reverse osmosis models can be di-vided into three types: nonporous or homogeneous membrane models (such as the solution-diffusion, and extended solution-diffusion models); irreversible thermodynamics mod-els (such as Kedem-Katchalsky and Spiegler-Kedem models); and pore models (such as preferential sorp-tion-capillary flow).

Diffusion-Based Models (Nonporous Models)

Solution-Diffusion Model

The solution-diffusion (SD) model was proposed by Lonsdale et al. (1965); as its name implies, this model is based on diffusion of the solute and solvent through the mem-brane.

(1)

(2)

Where Cwm is the water concentra-tion in the membrane and Dwm is the water diffusivity in the membrane, and Vw is the partial molar volume of water.

The model assumes that: (1) the RO membrane has a homogeneous, non-porous surface layer; (2) both the solute and solvent dissolve in this layer and then each diffuses across it; (3) the solute and solvent diffu-sion is uncoupled and due to its own chemical potential gradient across the membrane; (4) these gradients are the result of concentration and pressure differences across the mem-brane.

The principle advantage of the SD model is that only two parameters are needed to characterize the mem-brane system. As a result, it has been widely applied to both inorganic salt and organic solute systems.

Extended Solution-Diffusion Model

Burghoff et al. (1980) recognized that the SD model does not explain the negative solute rejections found for some organics and so formulated the extended-solution-diffusion model. They pointed out that the SD model does not take into account possible pressure dependence of the solute chemical potential which, while neg-ligible for inorganic salt solutions, can be important for organic solutes.

(3)

(4)

where Lwp and Lsp represent the parameters responsible for water and solute transport due to the pressure difference across the membrane.

Irreversible Thermodynam-ics Models

Some of the earliest RO membrane models were based on the principles of irreversible thermodynamics. Ir-reversible thermodynamics mod-els assume the membrane is not far from equilibrium and so fluxes canbe described by phenomenological relationships. One of the early mod-els was that derived by Kedem and Katchalsky (1958);

(5)

(6)

Where σ defined as the Stavermanreflection coefficient, (Cm)avg is the logarithmic mean solute concentra-tion in the membrane, ω is the per-meability coefficient at zero volumeflow, and Lp is the mechanical filtra-

Eng. Mohammed Al-Asaadi

A Brief Review Of

Reverse Osmosis Theory

BSc in Chemical Engineering -UOBMSc in Chemical Engineering -UOB

e-mail: [email protected]

Reverse osmosis is one of the most successful techniques for water purification due to the low production cost and the goodquality of the produced water. Currently it is approved as the standard process for brackish water desalination, while for sea-water it competes with the multi-stage flash dual-purpose plant.Many mechanistic and mathematical models have been pro-posed to describe reverse osmosis membranes. Some of these descriptions rely on relatively simple concepts while others are far more complex and require sophisticated solution tech-niques.


tion coefficient.

A disadvantage of the Kedem-Katch-alsky model is that the coefficientscan be functions of concentration. To avoid concentration dependence of the transport parameters, Spiegler and Kedem (1966) defined local wa-ter (Pw) and solute (Ps) permeabili-ties and reflection coefficients andthen represented the fluxes as;

(7)

(8)

The Spiegler-Kedem model has found wide use for the description and analysis of RO membrane sepa-rations.

While irreversible thermodynamics can describe RO membrane transport, a major disadvantage of these mod-els is the treatment of the membrane as a “black box” that is, these models provide no insight into the transport mechanisms of the membrane. As a result, irreversible thermodynamics models are not very useful for opti-mizing separations based on mem-brane structure and properties.

Pore Models: Preferential Sorption-Capillary Flow Model

An early pore model was the pref-erential sorption-capillary flow(PSCF) model proposed by Sourira-jan (1970); this model assumes that the mechanism of separation is de-

termined by both surface phenomena and fluid transport through pores inthe RO membrane. In contrast to the SD model, the membrane is assumed to be microporous. The model states that the membrane barrier layer has chemical properties such that it has a preferential sorption for the solvent or preferential repulsion for the sol-utes of the feed solution. As a result, a layer of almost pure solvent is pref-erentially absorbed on the surface and in the pores of the membrane. Solvent transport occurs as solvent from this layer is forced through the membrane capillary pores under pressure.

The water flux according to thismodel is given by

(9)

(10)

where A is the pure water permeabil-ity constant of the membrane and (X) π represents the osmotic pressure of the feed or permeate side with solute mole fraction X, and KD is the distri-bution coefficient of the solute fromthe feed into the pore of the mem-brane and Dsp is the diffusivity of the solute in the membrane pore.

Several other transport models for RO membranes have also been pro-posed in the literature.

Concentration Polarization

Concentration polarization is the term used to describe the accumu-

lation of rejected solute at the sur-face of a membrane so that the sol-ute concentration at the membrane wall is much higher than that of the bulk feed solution. As water passes through the membrane, the convec-tive flow of solute to the membranesurface is much larger than the dif-fusion of the solute back to the bulk feed solution; as a result, the concen-tration of the solute at the membrane wall increases.

The widely-applied film theory de-veloped by Brian (1966) is the fol-lowing;

(11)

Where is the film thickness, Vw is the Permeate velocity, (Cw) is the wall concentration, (CF) is the bulk feed concentration and Dsw is Sher-wood number.

Possible negative effects of concen-tration polarization include: (1) de-creases in water flux due to increasedosmotic pressure at the membrane wall; (2) increases in solute fluxthrough the membrane because of increased concentration gradient across the membrane; (3) precipita-tion of the solute if the surface con-centration exceeds its solubility limit, leading to scaling or particle fouling of the membrane and reduced water flux; (4) changes in membrane sepa-ration properties; and (5) enhanced fouling by particulate or colloidal materials in the feed which block the membrane surface and reduce water flux.

Schematic of a Solution-Diffusion Type Membrane.

References1. Jonsson, G., “Overview of Theories for Water and

Solute Transport in UF/RO Membranes”, Desali-nation, 35, 21 (1980).

2. Soltanieh, M., and Gill, W., “Review of Reverse Os-mosis Membranes and Transport Models”, Chemi-cal Engineering Communications, 12, 279 (1981).

3. Mazid, M., “Mechanisms of Transport Through Re-verse Osmosis Membranes”, Separation Science and Technology, 19, 357 (1984).

4. Pusch, W., “Measurement Techniques of Trans-port Through Membranes”, Desalination, 59, 105 (1986).

5. Dickson, J., “Fundamental Aspects of Reverse Osmosis”, in Reverse Osmosis Technology, B. Parekh, ed., pp. 1-51, Marcel Dekker, Inc., New York (1988).

6. Rautenbach, R., and Albrecht, R., Membrane Pro-cesses, John Wiley & Sons, New York (1989).

7. Bhattacharyya, D., and Williams, M., “Theory - Re-verse Osmosis”, in Membrane Handbook, W. Ho

and K. Sirkar, eds., pp. 269-280, Van Nostrand Rein-hold, New York (1992c).


2. Definitions

2.1 Hot Weather:

It is defined as any combination ofhigh air temperature, low relative hu-midity and wind velocity tending to impair the quality of fresh or hardened concrete or otherwise resulting in ab-normal properties. The climatic fac-tors affecting concrete in hot weather are high air temperature and reduced relative humidity. These effects may be considerably more pronounced with the increase in wind velocity. The effects of hot weather are most critical during period of rising temperature, falling relative humidity or both. They may occur at any time of the year in warm tropical or arid climates and generally occur during the summer seasons in other climates.

Precautionary measures required in calm humid day will be less strict than those required on a dry windy day if air temperature is identical (AC1 - 305 R)(2).

The distinctive features define “hotarid climates” are:

1- Air temperature exceeds 40 oC. 2- Average R. H. less than 50%.3- Dry winds and dust storms. 4- Rate of evaporation exceeds l.0

Kg/m2/hr.

The distinctive features define “warmhumid climate” are:

1- Daily temperature from 25 °C to 35 oC.

2- High R.H. (Over 60%)3- Annual rainfall (At least 50 cm)

2.2 Tropical Regions:

Tropical regions lying mostly between lines 25 south to line 25 north Equa-tor, areas from line 15 to 45° north and south are characterized by hot arid cli-mates

3. Hot Weather Effects:

3.1. Undesirable hot weath-er effects on concrete in plastic state may include:

a- Increased water demand,b- Increased rate of slump loss and

corresponding tendency to add water at job site.

c- Increased rate of setting result-ing in greater difficulty with han-dling, finishing,

curing and increasing the possi-bility of cold joints.

d- Increased tendency for plastic cracks.

e- Increased difficulty in controllingair content.

3.2. Undesirable hot weath-er effects on concrete in the hardened state may in-clude:

a- Decreased strength resulting from increased water demand and increased

temperature level.b- Decreased durability.c- Decreased uniformity of surface

appearance.d- Differential thermal cracking.

4. Effect of Additional Fac-tors

Other factors complicate hot weather operation should be considered along with climatic factors and may include:

a- The use of concrete with high compressive strength requiring higher cement

content.b- The design of thin concrete sec-

tions with correspondingly great-er percentage of

steel.c- The increased size of concrete

delivery trucks.d- Requirements for movement of

large volumes of low slump con-crete over greater

horizontal or vertical distances.e- Increased use of concrete pump-

Eng. Adel Salamn

A Tablet For

Hot Weather Concrete1. Introduction: The following is a brief of some practical points about the adverse effects of hot weather on concrete in its vari-ous states. In other words this study concentrated on the problems that may occur during production, delivery, harden-ing and final setting of concrete due to exposure to hotweather effects and how to minimize the harms of those effects on the final product.


ing equipments.f- Increased use of conveyor belts.g- Economic necessity to continue

work in extremely hot weather.

5. Conclusions

Based on the analysis and discussion of test results produced in this inves-tigation, the following conclusions are conducted:-

1- The addition of Superplasticizers enables the manufacturer to re-duce w/c ratio and/ or use silica fume with the same consistency.

2- Silica Fume concrete requires greater amounts of water and has higher rate of slump loss, but has the character of lower bleeding and lower segregation that it can be pumped efficiently with theuse of Superplasticizers to im-prove workability.

3- The use of 20%, 15% Silica Fume replacing cement increased the compressive strength or concrete by 33%, 42% respectively for concretes cured in hot weather conditions (T= 50oC, R.H. = 45%).

4-The use of 15% Silica Fume ad-dition with 1% Superplasticizers increases compressive strength for concrete cured in hot water (40°C) by 54% relative to that of plain concrete cured in the same temperature.

5- Silica Fume improves concrete ability to withstand hot weather conditions, since its compressive strength increases gradually with curing temperature till 40°C for mixes having cement content 350 kgs and S.F. adding ratio 15%.

6- Longer period moist curing is re-flected on compressive strengthespecially for silica fume con-crete (C90/C28 = 122%).

7- Unit weight of concrete is slight-ly lowered for specimens cured in dry hot weather conditions.

8- Splitting tensile strength increas-es with curing water temperature

till 30o C then it begins to de-crease.

9- Silica Fume concrete has better tensile strength especially in hot weather (Achieved 33% over the plain mixes cured at the same temperature).

10- Modulus of elasticity increases with S.F. replacing ratio increase, for normal curing or hot weather curing but it decreases relatively for concretes cured in adverse hot weather conditions (5%av-)

11- Superplasticized concrete has improved stiffness reaches 8% better than plain concrete cured in water 20oC while this ratio is 4 % only when concrete cured in dry hot weather.

6. Recommendations.1- All precaution in production, de-

livery and placement of concrete in hot weather must be taken into consideration such as the follow-ing:a- The use of cold mixing water

will result in a moderate re-duction in temperature of con-crete as placed.

b- Addition of ice as a part of mixing water is highly effec-tive in reducing concrete tem-perature.

c- Shading the supplies, sprin-kling or fog spraying of coarse aggregate stockpiles is effec-tive in reducing aggregate temperatures by evaporating and direct cooling.

d- Concrete must be handled and transported with a minimum of segregation and slump loss.

e- Selection of proper type of ce-ment and reducing the cement content in mix

design as possible will be of great effect concrete.

f- Painting mixer surfaces white to minimize solar heat will be of some help.

g- Concrete to be placed where it

is to remain,h- Concrete to be placed in lay-

ers shallow enough to assure vibrator well penetrate into the layer below.

i- The joints to be made on sound, clean concrete.

j - The finishing operations andtheir timing to be guided only by readiness of

concrete for them.2- It is recommended to maintain

temperature of fresh concrete mixes not more than 30°C.

3- Silica fume is of great benefiton fresh and hardened concrete characters if used accompanied by superplastizers in hot weath-er.

4- It is recommended to avoid dry curing as possible for moist cur-ing gives higher strength values and problems of drying shrink-age may appear with dry curing.

5- Sealing compounds improve strength for vertical elements relatively especially with silica fume concrete.

6- The longer the period of moist curing, the better the resulting concrete properties.

7- Superplasticizers are recom-mended to reduce water require-ments of concrete in hot weather and improve workability and hardened concrete properties.

References:1- “Concrete in Hot Weather” A scientific thesis

for M.Sc. Author “Adel H. Salman”, MenofiaUniversity, Egypt, 1997

2- ACI committee 305R “Hot Weather Concret-ing” ACI manual of concrte practice- part 2- Detroit, Michigan 1986.

3- Swayze, M.A. “Finishing and curing: A key to durable concrete surfaces” ACI Journal Pro-ceedings v.47, Dec. 1959.

4- Taylor, W.H. “ Concrete Technology and Prac-tice” chapter 30, Longman 1986

5- Melhotra V.M.& Ramachandran V.S. “ Con-densed Silica Fumes in Concrete”, Ottawa, Canada 1987.

6- “Effect of Temperature on Properties of Super-plastisized Concrete” Yamamoto, Y. & Kobay-shi S., ACI Journal, Feb. 1986

Visit our Websitewww.mohandis.org


From the above we can see that safety is one concern of human factor engineering that can affect the product sale during its life cycle.

The product life cycle can be defined asstages, a particular product pass through, from the date of introducing the product. It can be defines as the change in prod-uct sale volume verses time. See figure 1below.

2. Driver Drowsiness warn-ing system:2.1 Definition:Driver drowsiness is a major concern of transportation researchers today, and with good reason. Drowsy drivers are a major cause of motor vehicle accidents. Today’s automobile designs concentrate on com-fort and luxury. Reduced road noise and vibration are viewed as quality. However, these qualities in a vehicle can add to the problem of driver drowsiness. Operating a motor vehicle requires constant moni-toring of the surrounding environment. When a driver becomes drowsy it be-comes increasingly difficult to be atten-tive to the driving task.

From the above we can define drowsinessas a state during which sleep is perceived as difficult to resist, the individual strug-gles against sleep, performance lapses oc-cur, and sleep eventually ensues.

2.2 Statistics:Data taken over the five year period of1989-93 was recently summarized in a NHTSA Research Note. These national statistics were taken from the NHTSA General Estimates System (GES) and the Fatal Accident Reporting System (FARS) data sources. A summary of the findingsis as follows:

• There were 56,000 crashes annually in which driver fatigue/drowsiness involvement was cited in the police report (0.9 % of all crashes).

• There was an annual average of 40,000 non-fatal injuries due to drowsy drivers.

• There was an annual average of 1,357 fatal accidents involving a drowsy driver (3.6% of ail fatalities during the five year period).

2.3 Purpose of Driver Drowsiness warning sys-tem:The purpose of the warning signals is three-fold:

1. To advise the driver that a drowsi-ness condition has been detected.

2. To re-alert the drowsy driver.3. To maintain his or her alertness for

a period of time, making it possible to find a safe place to pull off theroad and refresh.

3. Measure and counteract of drowsiness:There are several devices that have been developed as attempts to measure and in some cases counteract drowsiness in driv-ers. These devices include eyelid closure monitors, head nodding monitors, and re-action time monitors.One device which monitors eyelid clo-sures is the Onguard developed by an Israeli company, Xanadu Ltd.. This bat-tery operated device, which consists of a small infrared sensor and an electronic processor, can be fitted to a standard pairof eyeglasses. The device directs a beam of infrared light at the eye and measures the light reflected back. When the eyeis closed the amount of light reflectedback is reduced. When the eye is closed for longer than 0.5 second an alarm is activated. Although this device has been shown to detect long eyelid closures, one flaw should be noted. It’s found that eye-glasses have a tendency to slip down the nose and as a result the alignment of the device may be in need of constant read-justment.Head nod detectors have also been mar-keted to detect drowsiness in drivers. The Electronic Transistor Safety Alarm and Dozer’s Alarm are two examples of this type of detection device. These units, each of which consists of an angular rotational detector, are placed over the top of the ear and buzz loudly when the head nods

Eng. Ali A. Majeed

Human Factors Engineering and Product Life Cycle Driver Drowsiness Warning System

BSc in Electrical Engineering -UOBMSc in Engineering Managemant -UOB

1. Introduction: The objectives of human factors engineering are to:

1.Enhance the effective and efficiency with work, reduce operational er-rors, increase safety, and improve systems performance.

2.Increase reliability, productivity, improve maintainability, lower worker turnover, reduce personnel, and training requirements.

3.Improve the working environment - reduce fatigue, physical stress, bore-dom, and monotony.

4. Increase human comfort, ease of use, user acceptance, quality of life and aesthetic appearance

5. Increase economy of production, increase work quality, reduces losses of time, and equipment.


forward past a certain angle. However, Dozer’s Alarm was found “Very Annoy-ing.” In addition to that, using a head nod detector gives drivers a false sense of se-curity. Another problem is the possibility that an individual may become extremely drowsy and even fully asleep before his or her head falls forward.Finally, there are reaction time monitors. Roadguard is one such device. Once in-stalled, the device is activated when a car is put into high gear. A timer stops at ran-dom periods of 4-14 seconds and a small red light is illuminated on the dash board. This light must be deactivated by the driv-er within three seconds or an alarm will sound. It’s found that this device to be the most reliable of the three types studied: Onguard, Dozer’s Alarm, and Roadguard. However, there still exist limitations with the device. The drivers could fall asleep behind the wheel for periods of less than two seconds. This suggests that the three second threshold of the Roadguard device may allow drivers to fall asleep and be involved in an accident before the alarm is activated. Although the preceding de-vices have been shown to detect drowsi-ness in some cases, none has been shown to alleviate drowsiness for any significantlength of time or lesson the decrease in driver performance.The ALERTMASTER and Button Steer-ing Wheel Alarm are also a reaction time monitor devices. The ALERTMASTER requires the driver to apply constant pressure on a pedal located to the left of the clutch. When constant pressure is not maintained the horn sounds. The ef-fectiveness of this device relies on the assumption that when a driver becomes drowsy the left foot will relax and not maintain the pressure needed.

The Button Steering Wheel Alarm op-erates on the same principle. In this de-

vice the button is located on the steering wheel. As with the ALERTMASTER, an alarm is activated when constant pressure is not maintained on the button. Fatigue may be a result of the constant pressure required by the drivers’ finger or thumb.Also, steering maneuvers and control ad-justments on the instrument panel may warrant removal of the finger or thumbfrom the steering wheel for short amounts of time.

Recent research was developed a detec-tion system which uses image processing of the driver’s face to detect diminished alertness. The image of the driver’s face is processed to locate the eyes and then determine the degree to which they are open. This information was shown to have a moderately high correlation (0.77) with an alertness index which was based on a combination of brain wave measure-ments, blinking rates, and facial expres-sions rated by observers.

Many studies involving drowsiness de-tection have been conducted. There are several physiological measures that have been proven time and time again to be good predictors of driver drowsiness. However, there are problems with record-ing these measures because the necessary instrumentation is either intrusive upon the driving task or annoying to the driver. For these reasons, performance measures as predictors have been the topic of nu-merous research projects. Over several years algorithms for the detection of drowsy drivers have been developed, re-fined, and validated. These algorithms areready to be implemented into a drowsy driver detection system (it will be de-scribed in section 5 page 8) Now the focus of research must move to the sequence of events which will occur after drowsiness has been detected in order to re-alert the driver.

4. Methods of Alerting:The goal of a warning is to change a per-son’s behavior. To be effective, warnings must be sensed, received, understood, and heeded. Thus, the warning must attract a person’s attention, convey the correct message, and suggest the correct action to be taken.

4.1 Warning Systems for Motor VehiclesWhen designing crash avoidance warn-ings for vehicles, the time available to react must be considered, and the alarm must be designed so that it conveys the appropriate level of urgency. Other as-pects that should to be considered in-clude variations in vehicles and drivers. The warning system must be compatible with many different types of vehicles. Another variation lies in the potential us-ers of these warning systems are people of all ages drive. They possess different physical, sensory, and cognitive abilities. Some drive alone and some drive with passengers. These differences will impact the effectiveness of an alarm, and should be considered when designing a warning system.

4.2 General warning device design:Preliminary human factors guidelines for crash avoidance warnings have been de-veloped. These guidelines suggest a gen-eral picture of an ideal warning system, and a summary of these guidelines is pre-sented below.An effective warning signal must be intru-sive and convey a sense of urgency. How-ever, warning systems in vehicles must not be so intrusive and urgent that they startle the driver, and possibly put him or her in more danger, or annoy the driver to the point that he or she will deactivate the system. At the same time, the warning must not be so conservative that it fails to result in the desired effect of alerting a driver of an approaching danger.Multiple levels of warnings should be used to alleviate the activation of urgent false alarms. The most urgent alarms should be saved for imminent crash warn-ing signals, with less urgent and less dis-turbing signals signifying earlier stages. The urgent alarms used for imminent crash warnings should also be unique. A certain frequency or pitch should be re-served for use only in a case of immediate danger.Alarms signifying immediate danger should be presented through two sensory modalities to improve their likelihood of being received. Because of differences

Figure 1, Product Life Cycle.


in drivers’ perceptions and differences in driving environments, dual modality alarms are likely to be more effective. For example, an auditory tone combined with a haptic stimulus is likely to be more ef-fective over a broad range of drivers than just a tone.Warning systems should ordinarily be activated automatically every time the vehicle is started. However, in the case of motor vehicles, it is probably neces-sary for the driver to activate the detec-tion/warning system for legal reasons. Nevertheless, drivers should be able to deactivate the system since it is possible that there will be unforeseeable situations when the system is not necessary, and if left engaged, would produce false or nui-sance alarms.Built in diagnostic tests should be imple-mented with the detection/warning sys-tem. These tests should be engaged every time the system is activated. If the built in diagnostic test detects a system failure the driver should be notified immediately.However, this information should not be displayed in such a way that the driver could mistake the warning for one requir-ing a more immediate response.Multiple settings should be available on warning alarms. These settings should be adjustable. When the vehicle is started the current settings should be obviously displayed or the settings should default to a predetermined setting. It is very likely that multiple drivers will drive one ve-hicle and possibly in different environ-ments. For example, settings may be changed for night time driving or driving in noisy environments, such as driving in a convertible with the top down or with the radio at a high, volume. In situations like these it is important that the driver be aware of the alarm settings and assure that they are in the most effective mode for the specific driver and environment.

4.3 Driver alertness warn-ings:There are many possible ways to alert a driver in a drowsy condition. These in-clude auditory displays such as tones, buzzers, rumble sound, and speech. Other possibilities include vibrations of the steering column or driver’s seat. The maintenance of the driver’s alert-ness is also necessary. Possible methods of maintaining a driver’s alertness level are seat vibration, supply of fresh air, driver involvement in a secondary task, and the use of a stimulating scent, such as peppermint. Another possible method of maintaining a driver’s alertness is the use of a lane-minder. It consists of sensors located in the vehicle which are able to sense the boundaries of the lane. If the ve-hicle exceeds those boundaries an alarm is activated.Warning systems specifically designedfor alerting drowsy drivers should follow the general guidelines presented above, as well as additional specifications whichare presented below.

1. Auditory displays:Auditory displays are generally preferred for their effectiveness in alerting. How-ever, special precautions must be taken to avoid startling or distracting the driver. Therefore, onset rates of 10 dB/msec and higher should be avoided. Also, it is sug-gested that sounds coming from a single area be avoided unless they are consistent with the direction of the hazard The fundamental frequencies used in acoustic warnings should be in the range of 500-3000 Hz, and frequencies easily masked by the ambient noise of the en-vironment should be avoided. Researches identified sound characteristics which in-crease the perceived urgency of a warn-ing signal. These characteristics include a high repetition rate, high intensity,

high fundamental frequency, and large frequency oscillations (warbling, for ex-ample).When considering speech warnings there are several areas of concern. Voice dis-plays are not capable of conveying a mes-sage as quickly as other modes of alert-ing. Also, care must be taken so that the warning voice is discernible from that of a passenger or radio messages. For these reasons, speech warnings may be most ef-fectively used as part of a combination of two or more types of warnings.

2. Tactile displays:Subjects participating in driving simulator studies have shown a greater reduction in their level of alertness than subjects in-volved in road studies. Simulators, for the most part, have a smoother ride and less road vibration than an actual car. This sug-gests that vibration may have an alerting effect and for this reason, should be con-sidered a viable warning signal for driver drowsiness. It is suggested that tactile displays, such as vibration, be located in the driver’s seat or the steering column. The vibration frequencies of such warn-ings should be in the range of 100-300 Hz. However, these frequencies are much higher than vibration frequencies normally considered to affect operators. Therefore, lower frequencies may be appropriate.

3. Visual displays:A visual display is suggested to be used as an initial signal in a warning system. However, in a drowsy driver alerting sys-tem the use of visual displays is problem-atic. If a driver is drowsy and inattentive he or she may be less likely to perceive a visual warning in time to react appropri-ately. Also, most stimuli presented during driving are presented through the sensory channel of vision. Use of a visual display may overload this channel, and possibly distract the driver. If a visual signal is used as part of a warning, it should be presented

Figure 2, Lane Position Recognition System for Time to Line Crossing (TLC)


within 15 degrees of the driver’s normal line of sight of the roadway.

4. Termination of warnings:Warnings which are automatically trig-gered by a specific condition should bepresented for at least one second and until the triggering condition no longer exists. This time period should give the driver enough time to recognize the purpose of the alarm. Immediately following the ter-mination of the alarm the system should be reactivated in order to detect any quickly reoccurring decrease in alertness. Some warnings may require manual termination by the driver. The mode of termination in these cases should not be too easily ac-cessed. It is possible that the termination of warning signals could become habit, just as in pressing a snooze button on an alarm clock. For this reason, the termina-tion control should require some physical motion on the part of the driver.

5. Application:Many accidents involving drowsy driv-ers occur when the driver allows the car to drift off the side of the road. These ac-cidents have been labeled Drift-Off-Road (DOR) accidents. A study of police acci-dent reports in the 1980’s showed this type of accident was the leading contributor to the total number of accidents on the Penn-sylvania Turnpike. Fifty-seven percent of all accidents on the Turnpike in 1986 were classified as DOR accidents. Because ofthe frequency of DOR accidents, alerting drivers who are drifting became an area of interest.A strip of patterned pavement along the shoulder of a road called a rumble strip has been effective in reducing the num-ber of DOR accidents. If a driver drifts off the road, onto a shoulder having a rumble strip, the tires on the grooved or uneven pavement produce a loud sound and vibra-

tion. The California Department of Trans-portation tested a rumble strip pattern on a monotonous road between Las Vegas and Los Angeles. A 45% reduction in DOR accidents was reported after the installa-tion of the rumble strip. The Pennsylvania Turnpike began installing their version of rumble strips, SNAPS (Sonic Nap Alert Patterns), in 1987. Data collected between one year and three and one-half years after the installation of the SNAPS showed a 70% reduction in DOR accidents.Although these results indicate that rum-ble strips are quite effective, there are some negative issues which need to be ad-dressed. The installation of rumble strips in every shoulder of every road would be very time consuming and expensive. Also, there is the problem of only one side of the road being equipped. Because of intention-al lane changes (i.e. passing), the inside boundary of the lane is more difficult toequip with rumble strips. However, a sim-ulated rumble strip effect (a combination of vibration and a rumble sound) produced from within the vehicle when a drowsy driver has been detected may prove to be a very effective countermeasure to drowsi-ness.This idea has been investigated in recent research. Daimler Benz (1994) has devel-oped an image processing system for lane position recognition. This process takes into consideration a vehicle’s initial posi-tion, steering angle, and speed to determine the path the vehicle is predicted to follow if no adjustments are made (see figure 2below). The Time to Line Crossing (TLC) is then calculated. If this time is one sec-ond or less a warning signal is activated.Three types of warnings were investigated: acoustic, haptic, and corrective haptic. The acoustic warning used was a simulated rumble strip sound emanating from either side of the vehicle depending on which side of the lane the vehicle was close to

exceeding. The haptic warning was steer-ing wheel oscillation, and the corrective haptic warning was steering wheel oscil-lation combined with a corrective pull of the steering wheel. In other words, if the vehicle was moving toward the right side of the lane the steering wheel would be pulled slightly to the left to initiate correc-tion.The Daimler Benz (1994) study resulted in an overall positive judgment concerning the acoustic warning by subjects. Subjects also found the acoustic warning “enliven-ing”. This suggests an acoustic warning is not only effective at immediately alerting a drowsy driver but it may have a sustained alerting effect as well.

6. Conclusion:From the figure bellow we conclude that af-ter introducing the lane recognition system by Mercedes-Benz in 1995, the demand on the car was increased yearly, starting from year 1995. Although the increase in sales can’t be surly attributed to the introduction of the lane recognition system as a driver drowsiness warning system (because each year more than a system, future and dif-ferent shapes are introduced that affect the market share), it still have its effect on the market and the product life cycle of the car.

7. Scent as a refreshing and countermeasure to drowsy driver:The use of scents as a countermeasure to drowsiness was investigated in a study conducted by Kaneda et al. (1994). The refreshing effect of four scents, lavender, lemon, jasmine, and peppermint, were compared. The results showed that pep-permint had the greatest refreshing effect. Kaneda et al. (1994) attributed this find-ing to the menthol found in peppermint. The stage of alertness at which the scent was introduced had an effect on the last-ing refreshing effect of the scent. When the scent was introduced to a subject who was already experiencing a low level of alert-ness, its effect was brief in comparison to when the scent was introduced immediate-ly following the first signs of a decrease inalertness. When a buzzer was sounded im-mediately before the release of the scent, the refreshing effect was extended from approximately 3 minutes to approximately 11-16 minutes. Although the Kaneda et al. (1994) results are impressive, there was no statistical analysis of the data, and the experimental method used was not clearly described. Therefore, further investigation into the use of scents as a method of alert-ing drowsy drivers is needed.

Figure 3, Mercedes Benz Car Sales.Al-Mohandis - 43December - 2005

The prepaid mobile service is perfect for small businesses, families, students, teen-agers and travelers whereby they can bud-get their calls. There are no restrictions on calling locally or internationally so long as there is a credit balance.

Advantages of Prepaid ser-vice for subscribers:

• Effective Cost Control • Easy Usage of Service • Control of Refill• No Monthly Rental • No Monthly Bills • No Deposit • No Credit Rating Required • The mobile Phone as a Gift • Cutting costs for Mobile Telephony

What makes mobile pre-paid service (PPS) different from the post paid service?

• Pre-paid service is basically dif-ferent from the post paid service because the subscriber pays before he/she gets the service;

• PPS enables the subscriber to buy the pre paid card and use it accord-ing to his capacity and need;

• It is easy to buy the mobile tele-phone service and save money ef-fectively;

• It enables the subscriber to get mo-bile service without any guarantee;

• Enables the subscriber to get tem-porary mobile telephone service;

Reduced Costs with Pre-paidTypically, prepaid packages have lower

handset subsidies than traditional con-tracts. Prepaid ‘SIM only’ packs enable users to reuse ‘old’ handsets and, there-fore, increase the subscriber base, without requiring a subsidy. The credit history of potential subscribers is not checked and, because the service is paid for ‘up front’, there is no risk of bad debt for the op-erator. This also removes the expense of credit investigations.

Better Cash ManagementThe fact that prepaid subscribers pay ‘up front’ for airtime means that there is a posi-tive effect on the operator’s cash flow. It isalso important to position prepaid services so that they do not detract from the guaran-teed monthly revenue stream from post-paid subscribers. By limiting the airtime allotted to prepaid subscribers, it is possible for both services to complement each other by offer-ing a wider choice to the consumer.

Subscription StatusThe status of a subscription changes auto-matically, depending on a number of fac-tors, such as when the most recent refillwas performed.

Prepaid Lifecycle:Your Prepaid account is for you to enjoy. However, the lifecycle of your Prepaid account passes through different stages based on time validity of the refill vouch-er used.1-Installed State:The Installed State is the initial state of pre-paid subscription. Calls are allowed to the Announcement Service Terminal – Digital Reception AST-DR and to Customer Care

for the purposes of installing credit. No in-coming or outgoing calls are allowed, and no forwarding is allowed. It is possible for the Network operator to include an initial credit value in all subscriber accounts. This credit value is available to subscribers who use the service for the first time to call cus-tomer care. Subscribers may require the initial credit value to call Customer Care, if these calls are charged. 2- Active State:An Active state is achieved when you refill your account with any type of theexisting vouchers. You will have call credit time validity, based on the type of voucher used.

During Active State, you can:• Receive incoming calls.• Make outgoing calls (provided you

have credit).• Forward incoming calls.• Make calls to emergency services

and free phone numbers.• If you run out of credit, you will not

be able to make outgoing calls or to forward your calls.

3- Inactive State:A Prepaid subscription is in the Inactive State when it no longer contains credit, before its credit validity period expires. Incoming calls that are not charged are al-lowed, but no outgoing calls are allowed, except to emergency numbers, freephone numbers, and the AST-DR. No forward-ing is allowed, except to voicemail, if these calls are not charged. Voicemail numbers to which

subscribers can be forwarded free of charge are defined in a Network operator-specific list.

Eng. Shatha Waswasi

Pre-Paid Service (PPS)The PrePaid service allows customers to pay for a network subscription and airtime usage in advance of any calls made in the network, and to have their credit balances reduced by usage in real-time. In a PrePaid Service the subscribers have charging accounts issued to them. Provided their individual account has prepaid units available and the subscription has not expired, the subscriber can make outgoing calls. The prepaid subscriber can also receive incoming calls as long as the account has not expired.


4. Deactive State:A Deactive state occurs when the validity period has ended.

During Deactive State:• You can make calls to top up your

account, Pre Paid Calling Cards IVR and emergency services only.

• You will NOT be able to receive neither incoming calls nor SMS, make outgoing calls nor SMS or forward your calls.

You will have a grace period of days de-pend on marketing plane during which the customer must refill his account withany type of vouchers.5. Expired State:Your account will be cancelled if you do not refill with any Refill Voucher via any of therefill channels provided by your operator.

Different type of Refilling Method:Customer can buy Refill Vouchers thatavailable in the market retail outlets

and use any of the below refill methodsprovided by the operator:

• Through IVR and follow the voice instructions.

• Short Code Access, to refill theaccount by using short codes (USSD).

• Using Credit Card - by contacting the Customer Call Center.

• Through E-Channels, which are Telebank, e-bank, m-bank, e-Call-Center.

It is possible for a Network operator to allow all subscribers to dial directly into the Refill feature, provided that the sub-scribers are not refill-blocked. If subscrib-ers are not refill-blocked and successfullycomplete an account refill, they will hearan announcement informing them of their new balance and account expiry date. The call is then released, and the refill-blockedcounter is reset to zero. The subscriber is not charged for using this service. If sub-scribers are refill-blocked and attempt torefill through the AST-DR, they will hearan announcement asking them to contact Customer Care.

Call Scenario’s1- Originating Calls:When a subscriber makes an originating call, the Called Party Number is analysed Checks on the subscriber’s balance and the Account Expiry Date are made. If the subscriber has credit and the subscriber’s account has not expired, a check is made to see if the Called Party Number is barred. If the Called Party Number is barred, an

announcement is played to indicate this to the subscriber; otherwise, the call is con-nected. When prepaid subscribers have no units in their account (that is, no call credit, Inactive State) and attempt to make an originating call (except to the emergen-cy services, freephone numbers), an an-nouncement is played to inform them that they have no credit remaining. The service does not attempt to connect the call.

When a call is in place and a predefinednumber of charging units remain (offset reached), a low credit warning announce-ment or tone is played to the subscriber and the call is allowed to continue. Charging continues during the warning announcement or tone. It is, therefore, recommended that the warning announce-ment or tone be as short as possible. If all the available charging units are used during a call, an announcement is played to inform the subscriber that there are no units remaining and the call is released. If prepaid subscribers run out of credit dur-ing an originating call, the service verifiesif the Network operator requires the sub-scribers to have a ‘grace

period’ of time in which to continue their calls.

A timer is used to measure the grace pe-riod, which is given in seconds and cor-responds to the periodic pulse interval defined for a particular call tariff. Whenthe ‘grace period’ is complete, the call is released.2- Terminating Calls:In the case of terminating calls, the Called Party Number is used to identify the pre-paid subscription. When a terminating call is attempted, the service checks whether the call is to be charged. The subscription state is also checked. If the subscriber’s account is Active, the call is connected. If the subscriber’s account is in the Installed State, an announcement is played to the Calling Party and the call is released. How-ever, if the Network operator uses preacti-vation, the operator may have chosen to al-low an account to become active when the subscriber receives a terminating call.

If the account expiry date has passed, that is, the subscription is Deactive, an an-nouncement is played to inform the Call-ing Party that the subscriber number is not available. The call is then released. If the subscription has expired, an announcement is played to inform the Calling Party that the PPL subscriber number is not available. The call is then released. If the subscriber’s account has no units remaining, that is, the account is Inactive, and terminating calls are charged, callers hear an announcement informing them that the subscriber is un-available. Otherwise, terminating calls are

free and the call is connected.

When a call is in place and a predefinednumber of charging units remain (offset reached), a low credit warning announce-ment or tone is played to the subscriber and the call is allowed to continue. Charging continues during the warning announce-ment or tone. It is, therefore, recommend-ed that the warning announcement or tone be as short as possible. If all the available charging units are used during a call, an announcement is played to inform the subscriber that there are no units remain-ing and the call is released. If subscribers run out of credit during a terminating call, the service verifies if the operator requiresthe subscribers to have a ‘grace period’ of time in which to continue their calls. A timer is used to measure the grace period, which is given in seconds and corresponds to the periodic pulse interval defined for aparticular call tariff. When the ‘grace pe-riod’ is complete, the call is released.3- Balance and Expiry Date Enquiry Calls:It is possible for prepaid subscribers to query the service regarding their remaining balances, account expiry dates, and sub-scription expiry dates. The system checks the subscriber’s Account Expiry Date firstduring a Balance Enquiry call. If the sub-scriber’s Account Expiry Date has passed, prepaid system sets the Subscription State to ‘Deactive’. An announcement will then be played informing the subscriber that the account is now Deactive and the call is disconnected. The Network operator can decide whether or not to charge subscrib-ers for calls to the Balance Enquiry by means of a global switch.

AbbreviationsSIM Subscriber Identity ModuleAST-DR Announcement Service Terminal – Digital ReceptionIVR Interactive Voice ResponseSMS Short Massage SystemUSSD Unstructured Supplementary Service Data

References1- Prepaid Light (PPL) Ericsson Documents2- http://www.telecom.net.et/EthioMobile/prepaid.html

Figure 1, The Subscription Life Cycle.


Fire Prevention The first step to fire safety is to pre-vent the fire from originating. Thismight be achieved through:

• Promptly remove waste paper, packaging, old rags and other firehazards.

• Designate an employee to ensure that appliances, e.g. photocopiers and kettles, are switched off each night.

• Turn of computers and monitors before leaving the office.

• Make sure that there is plenty of air circulation space around heat producing equipment, e.g. photo-copiers and computers.

• Smoke only where allowed. Use large, non-tip ashtrays and make sure everything in them is cold before they are emptied.

• Keep passageways and exits free from storage and waste.

• Make sure that escape stairs and exit doors are not locked or blocked.

• Make sure that fire and smokedoors are kept closed.

• Make sure that any cracked, frayed or broken electrical cord or plug is replaced immediately.

• Do not overload power outlets or extension boards.

• If an appliance or item of equip-ment smells or gives off smoke, turn it off, unplug it and do not use it again until it has been checked by a qualified technician.

• Do not run electrical leads or cords across doors or walkways, or pinch them behind or under furniture.

Maintenance • All devices and equipments in the

workplace need to be suitable for the purpose intended, and shall be subjected to proper maintenance system.

• Poor maintenance of fire protec-tion appliances is a major prob-lem in trying to contain a fire.Make sure that all fire extinguish-ers, smoke alarms and fire pumpsare regularly checked and main-tained.

• Report any faulty equipment to the appropriate person.

Training• Ask to have a general training in han-

dling of available fire fighting facili-ties and understand their function

• Fire teams consisting of various divi-sions should be organized. The fireteam will have more specialized firetraining and leading role in case of fire incident. You need to know allmembers of the fire team

Plan Ahead • Know locations of all emergency

exits in your building. • Know where your nearest fire

alarm or manual call point is and how to use it.

• Know which fire protection equip-ment you might need to use.

• Develop an emergency plan for dealing with fires (This is a man-agement responsibility, but all employees should be involved).

• Make sure that copies of the plan are prominently displayed and that all employees (including new staff) are familiar with it.

• Ensure that fire drills are frequent-ly conducted.

• If you or one of your colleagues or any person likely to be in the building is disabled, make sure that this is included in the evacua-tion plan.

If a Fire Occurs • Sound the alarm and call the civil

Mr. Yousif Ali

The Office and WorkplaceFire Safety Planning

BSc in Chemical Engineering -UOBMSc in Engineering Managemant -UOB

Fire Safety in the Office

For some people, a fire at work can mean a few days off.However, this might not be the case. You or your colleague could be badly injured, even killed. In addition, a serious fire can mean that you lose your job – especially if no con-tingency plan was set in place. International statistics show that around 60% of businesses which suffer a serious firego out of business. Fire safety, therefore, is the responsi-bility of all staff in the workplace.


defense, no matter how small the fire.

• Only attempt to extinguish a fire ifit is small (no larger than a waste-basket), and you have the correct equipment to handle it.

• While escaping out of building, close doors behind you (this will help to limit the spread of fire andsmoke).

• Follow the emergency plan. • If smoke is present, crawl low (the

air will be clearer near the floor)• Before opening any door, use the

back of your hand to test for heat on the door surface. If the door is hot do not proceed. If the door is cool, open it cautiously.

• Once outside the building, go to the designated meeting point until your name has been noted and you are given further directions.

REMEMBER: Unless you have been told beforehand that a fire alarm isbeing tested, assume that the alarm is real.

Workplace Fire Safety Plan-ningFire safety affects every member of a firm to some extent for these mainreasons:

• All risk injury from fire• All depend on the continued well

being of the business for their jobs

• An error on the part of any one of them could lead to a fire startingor to a small fire spreading out ofcontrol

The involvement of everyone and success in applying fire safety mea-sures can best be achieved by devel-oping a system which integrates firesafety into the everyday work of the business.

1. MANAGEMENT RESPON-SIBILITIES

• to evaluate the severity of fire riskand to install right kind of fire pro-tection systems in line with fireseverity.

• To obtain advise from the Civil Defense and the Insurer to comply the above.

• to train and inform people what to do in the event of fire and how to

prevent fire• to organize a chain of manage-

ment responsibility to reduce firerisks

• to consider damage control

Evaluation Of Fire Risk • Management should be aware of: • the vulnerability of the premises

to fire damage:• the nature of the processes, con-

tents and materials • structural and other measures to

prevent the spread of fire• the protection of key points such

as control panels, power sup-plies and unique items of plant on which all other processes depend

• arrangements for the duplication and protection of records, designs, plans and patterns

• potential difficulties in reinstatingbuildings

• delivery times for new plant and • reactions of the firm’s customers

when faced with delays

Training Facilities Management should arrange for em-ployees to be given fire safety train-ing covering action in the event of fire, precautions to prevent fire andto handle installed fire fighting fa-cilities in case fire breaks –out.

2. IDENTIFICATION OF FIRE RISKS

Major fire starters• Malicious ignition by intruders or

employees • Misuse of electrical equipment • Cigarettes and matches • Mechanical heat and sparks • Heating plant • Children starting fires• packaging and wrapping • Rubbish burning

Above elements may set fire to• flammable liquids• combustible elements in the structure

and fittings• electrical insulation• textiles, plastics wood and paper • waste and rubbish

Reasons for spread• Delayed discovery • Presence of large quantities of

combustible materials• Lack of fire separating walls be-

tween production and storage ar-eas

• Openings in floors and walls be-tween departments

• Rapid burning of dust and ‘fly’ de-posits

• Oils and fats flowing when burn-ing

• Combustible construction of buildings

• Combustible linings of roofs, ceil-ings and walls

General Hazards And Precau-tions Related To Particular Processes/ Materials Machine processes

• Faulty electric motors may over-heat and ignite. Overloading the motor has a similar effect.

• Bearings may overheat. Shafting and belts are liable to cause firesby friction.

• Leaks from hydraulic powered machines on to heated surface are a source of danger.

• Oil soaked floors spread fire rap-idly.

• Sparks produced by grinding and cutting operations may ignite combustible materials.

• Fires may be started in mixing, sieving, grinding, teasing and some other processes from spark caused by hard materials acciden-tally introduced.

Process heating and drying • Fire may be started by overheat-

ing processes or result from com-bustible materials coming into contact with flames, hot elements,steam pipes or other hot surfaces.

• Leaks from hydraulic equipment on to heated surfaces may result in fire.

• Inadequate ventilation of vapors produced by drying processes can lead to explosions and fires.

• With oil- or gas-fired plant failureof controls such as ignition and flame failure devices can be re-sponsible for fires and explosionsinvolving unburned fuel.

Flammable liquids All liquids having flash points belowambient temperatures or below the temperatures to which they may be heated during processing are a spe-


cial danger. Their vapours are eas-ily ignited and even small ignition sources such as static sparks can cause explosions and fires. More-over their mobility is such that they can travel long distance to ignition sources and flash back as well.Gases Accidental leakage of even small quan-tities of flammable gas into air can re-sult in explosion or fire. Fire can also becaused by careless or faulty handling of equipment. The mobility of some gases is such that they can travel long dis-tances and collect in low lying areas. Gas cylinders including those contain-ing non-combustible gases are liable to explode when heated by a fire.Processes involving the production of dust

• Many of the powders used in, and produced by, industrial processes are explosible when suspended in air in sufficient concentrations.

• These clouds can be ignited by relatively weak ignition sources such as friction sparks and static electricity. The static spark danger becomes acute when powders are fed into flammable liquids. Dustor powder layers can be ignited by relatively low temperatures.

• Dust deposits in working areas and stores can lead to rapidly spread-ing fires. Dangerous secondaryexplosions can result if deposits are disturbed by primary explo-sions occurring within the plant.

• Fire can occur as smouldering in dust deposits and remain undis-covered for a long period before breaking out into flames.

Packaging • Packaging materials such as plas-

tics, paper and cardboard are usu-ally combustible. If a fire involvesbulk storage of such materials it could easily get out of control.

• Some plastics such as PVC give off particularly dense smoke and noxious, damaging fumes when they burn. Accumulations of waste packaging materials provide situ-ations in which fires can easilystart and they will help fire spreadquickly.

• Some methods of packaging re-

quire heating appliances to melt material and seal packages and these can cause fires. For examplea wax dipping bath can overheat or a shrink wrapping process care-lessly used can ignite nearby ma-terials.

Storage and warehousing • Fires in storage are difficult to

control once they obtain a hold. • Even small fires can cause sub-

stantial damage because of the high values of goods at risk and their susceptibility to smoke and water damage.

• Malicious ignition, surreptitious smoking, and heating and lighting equipment are the most common causes of fire. In some factoriesthe risks of fire involving storageare increased by not adequately separating stores from production areas. Frequently the main fire riskis the packaging not the contents.

3. Establishing A Fire Pre-cautions System When fire risks have been identifiedand considered the information ob-tained should be converted into:

• a fire precautions manual• instructions on action in the event of

fire• checklists for a routine checking system

Fire Precautions Manual The company fire/security manualshould include both the initial fireprotection requirements for build-ings, equipment or other features and the action needed to maintain standards day-to-day. The following are some suggested headings for the manual:

• Organization of fire protection andsecurity: the persons responsible and their duties.

• Structural precautions to prevent the spread of fire

• Means of escape • Security • Plant and equipment (design, in-

stallation and maintenance) • Waste collection, removal and

disposal General fire precautions• Fire protection equipment • Training

Action To Be Taken In The Event Of Fire Clear fire instructions are essential ifconfusion and unnecessary injuries are to be avoided. They also increase the likelihood of controlling and ex-tinguishing the fire before it has donemajor damage. Vital requirements to be covered are:

• Raising the alarm and calling the fire brigade

• Immediate attack on the fire• Evacuation

Routine Checklists The purpose of checklists is to ensure that the identified precautions can bemaintained on a permanent basis. A checklist procedure is recommended because it encourages on-the-spot constant attention to fire dangers. 4. OPERATING THE FIRE PRECAUTIONS SYSTEM The complete chain of management responsibility should be involved in operating the system but overall re-sponsibility should be taken by the fire safety manager.

Duties Of the Fire Safety Manager These should include

• keeping the fire precautions manualup-to¬date, in particular as to any new processes/ materials introduced to the premises

• supervising the routine checklist sys-tem and seeing that appropriate amend-ments are made when necessary

• carrying out the periodical audits using information obtained from engineering and maintenance staff where neces-sary

• acting on any hazards reported through the system with the help of departmen-tal heads and reporting to the chief ex-ecutive

• Making sure contractors work safely by operating ‘permit to work’ and ‘hot work permit’ systems

• Maintaining the available fire protec-tion systems in perfect working condi-tion and to include in-house mainte-nance of the systems as part of their day to day work.


Quality Culture:

Brown and Starkey (1994), defineculture as a set of values and guiding beliefs shared by members within an organization. Culture could improve TQM performance, as it reinforcesa a set of management practices and behaviours that should exemplify and reinforce learning organizational and TQM principles (Denison, 1990).

There are some arguments about implementing TQM in association to Culture. Carlos Noronha (2002), argues that TQM success or failure depends largely on how it is com-pounded with the relevant national and organizational cultures. Juran (1993) has a different opinion which is that there is no need to redesign a country’s culture to install the disci-pline of quality improvements.

His belief is that to make TQM work we need adherence to its principles, practices and techniques. Further-more Kano (1993), agreed with Juran’s beliefs. Kano stresses that culture is not a barrier to the imple-mentation of TQM. All the argu-ments emphased that any organiza-tion should take cultural background into account when implementing TQM because SMEs cannot develop an organisational culture that differs substantially from the prevailing cul-tural factors of the country in which it operates (Stefen Lagrosen, 2003).

Commitment:

Total quality is the responsibility of every member of the organization, but especially of those at the top. The top management leaders could be born or trained with the certain skills which make them able to influenceand lead others. Good management leadership is described as the one who ‘inspire’, ‘earns the trust and re-spect of the guys out there’, and ‘lis-tens to their problems and concerns, discusses how to deal with them and gets consensus for solutions’. Good leadership is shown by one who is committed to quality by action as well as by effective and persuasive management of employees. Thus leaders have to walk like they talk (Steve MC Cabe, et.al., 1998).

Communication:

The literature reviewed in this sec-tion indicated that there is a need to improve communication within SMEs organization in order to sup-port the improvement process (Cros-by, 1990). Oakland emphasised and warned that “Communication is possibly the most neglected part of many organizations’ operations”. Thus he listed ten methods of com-munication for quality improve-ment to support the customer-sup-plier interface. In Oakland’s words; “Excellent communication between customer and supplier is the key to

total quality. Failure to communicate effectively creates unnecessary con-fusion, resulting in loss of interest, defects and problems, which eventu-ally declining in quality. Therefore, communication network is an essen-tial for building trust and its vision, purpose and gaols must be shared with all employees; free the flowing,communication without fear is criti-cal to success.”

Teamwork:

All management gurus view team-work as essential to the proper func-tioning of TQM. Oakland proposed the use of teams to manage the pro-cesses and improve communication in order to eliminate barriers be-tween departments. Oakland and his colleagues have developed a model (DRIVE Model) for structured ap-proached to problem solving. The model consists of 5 key points in se-quence: Define, Review, Investigate,Verify and Execute.

Juran pointed out the need for team-work and his views on the attributes of successful teams can be general-ized as follows:

• Clear objectives and agreed on vital few goals.

• Openness and confrontation during discussion.

• Support and trust from all lev-el.

• Appropriate leadership.

TQM Applicability FactorsThe following is a summary of the main factors that affect To-tal quality performance. All the factors have been driven from the quality gurus and models. They are culture, commitments, communications, teams, customer-supplier relationship, sys-tem, education and training, and planning. These factors are complementary and significant in every interaction and initia-tive that occurs and they are regarded as “the essence in prac-tice” of an organisation committed to total quality management (Andrews, Heather A. 1994). Mr. Mahmood Al-Saeed


• Adequate training.• Good decision making and

feedback.• Individual development oppor-

tunities.• Roles and responsibility of each

member clear.

On the other hand Deming has en-couraged the use of Quality Im-provement Circles/ Teams while Juran and Crosby indicate teamwork to be a central theme in any quality improvement initiative.

The research conducted by Back and Yeager (1996), concludes that the main reasons teams fail at SME are; lack of focus on the mission; trapped in a group-think mindset in which no actions are taken until everyone agrees with every decision, insuffi-cient support for time and resources, departmental politics and quality ini-tiative only exists in team meetings.

Customers:

Bank (1992) claimed that “the cus-tomer is king”. Thus product and services should conform to customer wishes. Juran, et al (1988) pointed out that the demand and profit aregeneral indicators of customer sat-isfaction, but they do not tell why the customer is pleased. Therefore, a more detailed picture of customer satisfaction can be obtained through the use of market survey and ques-tionnaires, interviews and mainte-nance of a well planned and orga-nized complaint file.

Deming has developed “Customer- supplier chain” to explain the im-

portance of meeting customer re-quirements and the internal links to achieve the quality goals. Whereas Oakland cautioned that “The abil-ity to meet customer requirements is vital, not only between two separate organizations, but within the same organization.” Further to this he pointed out that one person can break the customer- supplier chain by be-ing not meeting the requirements of the customer, whether internal or external. Therefore the quality has to be managed, by involving everyone in the process throughout the orga-nization.

Education and Training:

Knutton (1994) claims that “al-though the aims of introducing TQM are similar between organisations, it takes on a different appearance in each adoption”. This is due to the existing in the level of training and education of all employees in the principles and tools of quality man-agement which is absolutely essen-tial in order to obtain their commit-ment and involvement in the quality improvement activities. The result of an effective educational/training program is an empowered workforce which ready and willing to accept new approaches to the way work is performed (Jens J. Dahlgaard, et.al., 1998).

However Wilkinson et al, (1993) in-dicate that there is a strong correlation between the leaders and the degree of success of the QM programme. The more satisfied leaders were withtheir training, the more likely they

were to rate the QM programme as having a positive effect on indicators such as productivity, customer com-plaints, customer satisfaction, sales and profitability (Ghobadian, A. andWoo, H., 1994)

References and Bibliography

• Andrews, Heather A., (1994), “Organizational transformation in health care: a work in prog-ress “, San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers.

• Carlos Noronha, (2002), “Culture-specificTQM in China: Case Studies for Theoretical Consideration”, Asian Business & Manage-ment, volume:1, pp.125-145

• Crosby, Philip B., (1990), “By George, I think I’ve got it! (Total Quality Management Con-cept)”. HR Focus, V68, N12, p.23.

• Denison, D. (1990), “Corporate Culture and Organizational Effectiveness”, John Wiley & Sons, New York, NY.

• Ghobadian, A. and Woo, H., (1994), “Compar-ing the Premier Quality Awards of Four Con-tinents”, Occasional Paper No. 13, Middlesex University Business School, London.

• Jens J. Dahlgaard, Kai Kristensen, Gopal K.Kanji, Hans J.Juhl, Amrik S.Schal., (1998), “Quality management Practices: a comparative study between East and West”, International Journal of Quality and Reliability Management , Volume;15, No 8/9, pp.812- 826.

• Juran, J.M. (1993), “Made in USA: a renais-sance in quality”, Harvard Business Review, Vol. 71 No. 4, pp. 42-50.

• Kano, N. (1993), “A perspective on quality ac-tivities in American firms”, California Manage-ment Review, Vol. 35 No. 3, pp. 12-31.

• Stefen Lagrosen, (2003), “Exploring the impact of culture on quality management”, Interna-tional Journal of Quality and Reliability Man-agement vol.20. No.40, PP- 473-487.

• Steve MC Cabe, John Rooke, Davide Seymon and Phil Brown, (1998), “Quality managers, authority and leadership”, Construction Man-agement and Economics, Volume 16, pp.447-457.

• Thomas A.J., (2003), “Quality systems imple-mentation in Welsh small- to medium-sized en-terprises: a global comparison and a model for change”, Proceedings of the I MECH E Part B Journal of Engineering Manufacture, April, vol. 217, no. 4, pp 573-579.


Information Technology Capabilities in the Kingdom of Bahrain:

Strength and Challenges

While entering the international software market is not very hard, maintaining competitive and viable position has proved to be the real challenge [3]. A number of factors have been thought of by several au-thors as key elements to successfully sustain a software industry within a given country. Some of the major fac-tors are: Human Resources such as education and on-job training; Com-munication Infra-structure; Research and Development. But the most im-portant factor is a clear and firm strat-egy (2-7,10).

Bahrain is considered, by the United Nation as one of the high Income countries and ranked as the 36th country in their human developed report for the year 2003 (4). In order to sustain, yet to improve this state of human development, more atten-tion should be given to the technol-ogy diffusion within the country and the use of ICT to develop the innova-tive ability of the country’s economy.

The economy needs to change from a technology importing economy to a technology generating one.

In this article we look at Bahrain, eval-uate its readiness to enter the informa-tion era, and address the challenges to be phased preparing to compete in the software industry. Telecommunication Infrastructure

Constructing the telecommunication infrastructure is seen as the highest priority challenge phasing the devel-oping countries to benefit from ICT(5). Bahrain’s telecommunication infrastructure, on the other hand, is matured, very reliable and reaches all over the country. Table 1 shows the compatibility of the Bahraini in-frastructure with respect to the oth-ers. Except for the fixed telephoneline, Bahrain is in a competitive po-sition with the High Human Devel-oped countries. The low number of the fixed telephone lines is consistentwith being a late comer to acquiring technology. It exhibits a higher ex-

pansion in the most resent communi-cation technologies.

Enquiring information and commu-nication technology infrastructure, though, is only the first step in tech-nology transfer. Technology transfer does not mean just the rapid spared of new technology within a region since this does not; by any means, measure the real development of a society. It is more important to develop the ability to evaluate and select such technolo-gies, to utilize, adapt, improve, and finally, to further develop them [13].

Bahrain has not fully benefited fromthe IT infrastructure it has built. Though Bahrain has been classi-fied, by the United Nation HumanDevelopment Report of 2003, in the high human development group and though from Table 1 we note that its telecommunication infrastructure is competitive with the high human de-velopment countries, its high technol-ogy export as a percentage of manu-factured export is 0%. On the other

College of Engineering - University of BahrainEmail: [email protected]

By Dr. Wafa Al-Mansoori

In a rapidly changing global environment, Information Communication Technol-ogy (ICT) is considered as one of the most promising ways in reducing the gap between the developing and the developed countries. ICT has been recognized in international development as the tool of choice to promote sustainable human de-velopment (1). The globalization of the software industry has attracted an increas-ing number of developing countries to enter this industry and be a successful story. India is considered to be a very promising example to follow (2,3,5,7).

Year 2001(per 1000 people)

Bahrain High Human Development Medium Human Development

Telephone mainlines 267 511 102Cellular Subscribers 460 529 73Internet Users 203.4 328 7

**Source: Human Development Report, 2003, UN

Table 1: Telecommunication Infrastructure.


hand, the software export of state of Kerla, which is one of the poorest states of India, in 2000-2001, came to $ 24 million (7). In general Bahrain exporting consists of primary goods with the manufactured export making only 13% of the total merchandise ex-ports in the year 2001 while it is 81%, 58% and 29% for the high human de-veloped, medium human developed and low human developed countries respectively (4).

ICT is correctly seen here as one of the most significant forces of modern-ization, but for many people as well as institutions computerizations and automation means accumulation of hardware only (7). No consideration is given to the extent of software in-dustrialization that can be achieved which leads to the under utilization of ICT hardware available. ICT Policy

Recognizing the importance of ICT in the new globalize world, a number of the developing countries have adopted national IT policy and an implemen-tation strategy. Bahrain is yet to clear-ly establish its policy. Bahrain can benefit from governmental and nongovernmental organizations, of other countries, with experience in training to develop a center for ICT (5). Such a center of excellence should target to establish an advance ICT policy for the country, come up with a solid training program to prepare the hu-man resources needed to achieve the set goal, and finally to have a way tomeasure the effectiveness of the poli-cy and the impact the use of ICTs has on the countries development. Such a center can be responsible for train-ing local trainers, educators, decision makers and evaluators on the latest advanced and techniques in informa-tion technologies and the use of latest communication and network facilities (8). Education

Bahrain is a young society with more than 60% of its population of the age of 24 and younger with a very high awareness to the importance of edu-cation. While there is no legal man-date to basic education, all children at the age of 6 are enrolled in schools (9) with a net primary enrolment ratio of 96% which is comparable to high and medium human development countries: 98% and 88% respectively (4). We also note that the net second-

ary enrollment ratio of the academic year 2000-2001 is at 92%, which is considerably high. This gives the government an excellent opportunity to integrate the education with the technology transfer projects underde-velopment. But to achieve this there must be a clear and formalized IT pol-icy. It is very important to integrate the science and technology policy in an overall policy for economic and social development (10). Uninformed and uncoordinated decision making will only lead to costly, but isolated and hence useless solutions (5).

A strong nation with information technology expertise, though, cannot emerge within a few years; it needs many years of national investments (2). While the population of Bahrain is rapidly increasing, the public ex-penditure on education as the percent-age of total government expenditure has reduced from 14.6% in the year 1990 to 11.4% in the years 1998-2000 at the same time, the total number of students in government schools has increased from 113,043 in the year 1990 to 115,818 in the year 2000-2001 (11). This means that the indi-vidual student share is actually reduc-ing which could hinder the ability of schools to produce students with the means needed to enter the informa-tion era.

Introducing the internet in schools and other learning institutes will fa-miliarize the new generation with the information technology and will fa-cilitate them with the basic required training to enter the real world of pro-duction. In return, ICT can be used to enhance the quality of teaching and learning (12). To do this, we have to train the educators and the trainers to use ICT innovatively and effec-tively. Computer science has been added as a compulsory course, after being an elective, to the high school curriculum (9), but it is needed to be introduced in a much earlier stage so that once the students reach the high school stage, they can master the in-ternet and use it as another resource of knowledge. One of the obstacles phasing planes for introducing inter-net services into earlier years is the budget; another obstacle is the short-age of educational software in Arabic. To solve this problem, the Ministry of Education is studying the possibilities of introducing the English language at the first year of the basic education

rather than the third year as it is now. Introducing a second language, espe-cially English, at such an early year is very beneficial in an era of global-ization but it should not be considered as a solution for the unavailability of educational resources in Arabic. More effort should be invested to imple-ment Arabic educational resources on the computer and internet which can be the niche specialization that Bah-rain can compete in. Human Resource Training

To compete in international software market, labors with advanced, spe-cialized skills are needed. This cannot be achieved by formal education only. Education is only a first step with amajor obligation of producing train-able individuals (9). Extensive off and on-job training of the people who would be using information technol-ogy should be a priority (5). Human resource training should target to mas-ter new imported technologies, update them to local condition, improve upon them, and export them (10). It is the amount of effort and financial supportgiven to the training programs that can make a difference. In Bahrain, the budget which was allocated, by the government, for employment training was utilized by 87.42% for the years 1990 – 1999. The surplus was not be-cause the amount of budget allocated (average of 2.6 million BD) was too high, but was mainly due to the fact that most of the people in charge of training do not have a complete pic-ture of the real training needs and the importance of improving the human resources within their firms. More-over, there is no general, clear, long term training goal (9). Let alone an ICT geared training goal.

The Ministry of Labor of Bahrain states its training policy as follows: “The Ministry contributes to the skills and capabilities of Bahrainis by con-ducting and supervising training pro-grams in fields that meet the needsand priorities of Bahrain’s economic and social development” (13). To do so the Ministry has established beside its regular organizations two specificcouncil for training, the first is fortraining in banking sector and the sec-ond in the Hotel and catering sector. Appling a good attention to the bank-ing sector, training in this sector has received high recognitions in the local as well as the regional area. To date the Ministry did not establish such


council for training for ICT, which in-dicates that the use of ICT to develop the countries economy is not one of the ministry priorities. More over, studying the figures related to thetraining expenditures released by the Ministry we note that the total amount of expenditure has increased by 33% from the year 1999 to the year 2000. This increase was mainly absorbed by the training of job seekers (an increase of 510%). The training of the unem-ployed though is not geared to trans-fer those job seekers to ICT fields.Research and Development

Research and Development (R&D) is by far the best measure category of innovation. While most of the high human developed countries have suc-ceeded in producing statistical maps of their national R&D landscape (4), Bahrain suffers from the lack of data and information to measure its R&D activities. The most promising fig-ures indicate that Bahrain spending on R&D does not exceed 0.5% of its gross domestic income (9) while it averages at 2.5% for the high human developed countries; a group Bahrain is considered one of (4). R&D should be targeting to produce, diffuse and covert information to knowledge then, knowledge into useful outputs (1). Baring in mind that most R&D activities have long-term return and the fact that we live in a society where

the social demand for technological development is week and the local market is too small to justify the cost of research, it is the government who has to pick up the R&D bill and direct the industry toward innovation. With the strong communication infrastruc-ture Bahrain has, a highly focused research center of excellence in infor-mation technology can be built taking in its consideration the regional as well as the local needs.

Final Remarks

Bahrain has gone a long way in es-tablishing an advanced and reli-able telecommunication system that reaches all over the country but it has not benefited from this infrastructureto enter the information era. For ICT to be fully utilized there is a need to work on the human resource develop-ment and gear it toward information technology. A close attention should be given to basic and higher educa-tion, a focused on and of-job training programs should be implemented. But most of all a clear goal must be carefully chosen, and their must be a way to measure what has been accom-plished. In setting our goal, there is a need to look farther than the national boundaries and evaluate the oppor-tunities available in the neighboring countries and biond. References1. UNDP 2002,2002 للعام العربية اإلنسانية التنمية تقرير

أيقونات املتحدة اإلمنائي, األمم برنامج العربي, لإلمناء العربي الصندوقاألردن .للخدمات املطبعية,

2. E. Carmel, “The New Software Exporting Nations: Success factors”, The electronic Journal on Infor-mation Systems in Developing Countries, EJISDC (2003) 13, 4, 1-12. http://www.ejisdc.org

3. P. Y. Abbott, “Software-Export Strategies for De-veloping Countries: A Caribbean Perspective”, The electronic Journal on Information Systems in Developing Countries, EJISDC (2004) 20, 1, 1-19. http://www.ejisdc.org

4. UNDP, 2003. Human Development Report 2003. http://www.undp.org/hdr2003

5. R. Davison, et. al., “Technology Leapfrogging in Developing Countries – An Inevitable Luxury”, The electronic journal of Information Systems in Devel-oping countries, EJISDC (2000) 1, 5, 1-10. http://www.ejisdc.org

6. T. Madanmohan, “Import-led Technological Ca-pability: A Comparative Analysis of Indian and Indonesian Manufacturing Firms”, ScienceDirect-Technovation, 23, March 2003. http://www.science-direct.com

7. K. Nair, and P. Prasad, “Development through Information Technology in Developing Countries: Experience from an Indian State”, The electronic Journal on Information Systems in Developing Countries, EJISDC (2002), 8, 2, 1-13. http://www.ejisdc.org

8. Ritsec, “Establishing a Regional Distance Learn-ing Network, Pilot Project”, Regional Information Technology & Software Engineering Center (RT-SEC), Regional Study, April, 1999, http://www.in-fodev.org/projects/education/025ritsec/25.pdf

9. UNDP 2001,لعام البحرين دولة في البشرية التنمية تقريراملطبعة الشرقية, البحرين, في اإلمنائي املتحدة األمم برنامج ,2001 .البحرين

10.J. Salomon, et. al., “The Uncertain Quest: Science, Technology, and Development”, United Nations University Press, 1994

11.Bahrain Government Homepage, Bahrain in Fig-ures, http://www.bahrain.gov.bh/english/RunIndex.asp?count=21

12.World Summit on the Information Society Docu-ment, 28, February, 2003. http://www.itu.int/dms_pub/itu-s/md/03/wsispc2/doc/so3-wsispc-doc-0012!R!!PDF-E.pdf

13.Ministry of Labor Homepage, Kingdom of Bah-rain.

Conferences & Exhibitions ScheduleTitle Location DateMiddle East Petrotech 2006 Conference and Exhibition

Bahrain International Exhibition Centre

16 - 18 January 2006

First Municipal Action Conference

Gulf International Convention Centre, Kingdom Of Bahrain

24 - 25 January 2006

11th Middle East Corrosion Conference

Gulf International Convention Centre, Kingdom Of Bahrain

26 February - 01 March 2006

Technology Transfer Gulf International Convention Center, Gulf Hotel 24 - 26 April 2006

3rd Middle East Metrology Conference and Exhibition

Bahrain International Exhibition Centre, Kingdom of Bahrain 29 - 31 May 2006

8th International Concrete Conference and exhibition

Gulf International Convention CentreKingdom Of Bahrain

27 - 29 November 2006


Date post:	12-May-2020
Category:	Documents
Upload:	others
View:	3 times
Download:	0 times