Construction World April 2023

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CESA President Olu Soluade delivering the opening address at the CESA Infrastructure Indaba 2023.

CESA’S ANNUAL INFRASTRUCTURE INDABA UNPACKS PROFESSIONALISATION, TRANSFORMATION IN SA’S BUILT ENVIRONMENT Consulting Engineers South Africa’s (CESA) annual Infrastructure Indaba, held recently in Durban, Kwa-Zulu Natal, unpacked the role that engineers continue to play in developing South Africa’s infrastructure, which provides the foundation for sustainable development enabling economic growth for future generations to come.

T he theme for this year’s Indaba, which was held in March, was ’Engineering the Future Now’. It provides a platform for stakeholders from all sectors of the built environment to come together and share knowledge and best practice aimed at ensuring the provision of value-for-money infrastructure for economic development and prosperity. The Infrastructure Indaba was officially opened by Chris Campbell, CEO of CESA. Olu Soluade, CESA President, during the first session, “Economic Reconstruction and Recovery Plan - Infrastructure Delivery and Maintenance of Public Assets”, called for government’s enhanced focus on ‘professionalising the state’ to enable the right people with the requisite skills, experience and competencies being placed in key positions. “This will ensure that money is spent in a cost-effective manner for both the social and economic benefit of the people of our country. As an industry organisation, our mandate is to lobby for

positive change within the regulatory environment to enable our members better serve society,” he added. In the focused discussion on “Building a capable state – Engineering Skills - Professionalisation of engineering services in the public and private sector,” Professor Mohamed Mostafa, an academic leader (Agri/Civil Eng & LS/CS) from the University of KwaZulu-Natal, emphasised that to enable sustainable development, our country needed to drive centres of excellence across various sectors. The lack of which would continue to impact service delivery in the country to those who needed it the most: “Poor infrastructure is a serious challenge to the development of communities and economic progress. It changes the lives of communities drastically and contributes to increased poverty.” In driving sustainability and excellence in this country, he believed there was an urgent need to eradicate corruption, lack of accountability and mismanagement; as well as to enhance

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