Construction World February 2022

GEOTECHNICAL ENGINEERING

JOB SA Engineering and Management was established in 2016. It is a geotechnical company that concentrates on various types of slopes stabilisation. ConstructionWorld spoke to its Managing Director, Leon Oosthuysen. GOING THE DISTANCE

Sketch the background of the company JOB SA Engineering and Management was registered in South Africa late in 2016, but I started the company as JOB LDA-Mozambique in 2002. I was diagnosed with leukaemia in May 2011 and had to move back to South Africa for treatment. After my treatment, I was advised by my doctors to stay in South Africa due to malaria that could be hazardous to my health. I was employed, first at Alexander Maintenance and then Penny Farthing. Sadly I was retrenched from the latter, and this led to me starting a slope stabilisation company. Our head office is in Humansdorp, Eastern Cape. The company registered a subsidiary in Ghana in 2017 (JOB AFRICA), Rwanda in 2018 (JOB RWANDA) and is busy starting similar companies in Uganda, Ethiopia and Namibia. What does the company specialise in? We specialise in slope stabilisation designs and we have also started a sister company Geo Equip Africa (GEA). We do installation of high tensile steel (HTS) meshes, catch fences, debris flow fences, and rock barriers. With our drilling equipment we can drill from 200 mm above ground level up to 450 m into various types of materials and to different depths and hole diameters. What would you say sets your company apart? We are a small management team, but we have the best staff in the business who love the work that they do. No job is too big or small. We also always try to provide our clients with the cheapest solutions, and aim to guarantee them a Initially we worked on small private works in South Africa. We had to belong to a variety of associations and had to meet cidb, tax and BEE requirements in order to tender for projects and become competitive. Our first project was in Ghana on the Accra-Buru Road. We installed 45 000 m 2 of double twisted mesh in three months for the Ghana Highway Authority. Thereafter we installed HTS for a private client before it all started to happen. The company was awarded a contract on the N3 Mooi River Toll road for the main contractor. In 2019 we got our break into the world of mining when we were appointed to install 57 000 m 2 of mesh at Scorpion Mine in Namibia. This was a challenge as we had to work at heights of 271 m. What stabilisation services do you offer? We do turnkey projects – where possible – with design engineers all over Africa. We will consider all types of stabilisations, from HTS mesh, rock fall barriers, double twisted mesh, gabions to any other new solutions and technology. Do you own your own specialised fleet? Yes we do, and have recently purchased our new four port minimum of 25 years product lifespan. How did the company develop?

powerpack that can run four drills at a time, with remotes. We also have various imported pneumatic drills that are

light and can drill up to 32 m up the slope. Do you also offer engineering and manufacturing?

Yes, we specialise in turnkey projects, from design to installation. We have done investigations and designs for various government road departments such as Ghana Highway Authority, Ethiopia Road Authority, Rwanda Transport Development Agency, etc. You are the sole distributors of Sireg products? Expand on this. We use our sister company GEA to market this. The product has already been in use for over 35 years in rope and is a fibreglass product that is used in the building and civil industry internationally. We have just done the first design and installation of the product on an Eskom project on the Majuba Railway line. Sireg glass fibre anchors are five times lighter then steel anchors and are four times stronger. What other products do you offer? JOB SA Engineering and Management also offer the supply of drilling equipment into Africa and the training on this equipment. Our sister company GEA offers the Sireg product, HTS Mesh products from 2 mm to 4 mm, as well as landslide barriers. What project are you currently involved with? We have been awarded two Sanral projects that started early in January. This project is a JV will be our first JV for Sanral. 

32 CONSTRUCTION WORLD FEBRUARY 2022