822P90130PCE UAE (NEWSLETTER2009No02)(AM)                                                             CHECK WEB: www.pceuae.net

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Dear Colleague

 

The general economic situation has not changed for the better since NEWSLETTER 2009 No 01. 

I had planned to complete NEWSLETTER 2009 No02 this weekend and issue it along with PCE UAE NOTICE of events for February.  The NOTICE with specific data was drafted last week when key information eventually became available but a number of negative delaying factors came in to play, not least attention by the Medical Profession, which prevented completion of the following more general information and comment. 

 

That plan included finishing everything today and e-mailing the result to PCE UAE UK-based PEI to forward to their members here.  However, last night we joined about 300 others to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the birth of Robert Burns, the Scottish National poet probably best known for ‘Auld Lang Syne’ sung by Scots and others worldwide.

 

The Burns’ Supper was held in the gardens of the Residence in Abu Dhabi of the British Ambassador to UAE.  The event was supported by the Dubai Pipe Band and a main speaker flown in from Glasgow, Scotland.  A good night was had by all – including contacts with two Scots MDs (CEng) of key engineering companies who agreed to address PCE UAE members later this year.  The 50 km drive home was eventful as it was in thick fog such that we got here around 3.00 this morning – fortunately our weekend!

 

All in all it is appropriate to quote Burns’s prophetic words in one verse of his poem ‘To a Mouse’ when as a ploughman he dug up a little mouse’s nest.

                                    ‘But, Mousie thou art no thy lane,

                                    In proving foresight may be vain:

                                    The best laid schemes o’ mice an’ men gang aft a-gley,

                                    An’ lea’e us nought but grief an’ pain for promis’d joy 

Certainly, ‘schemes’ including world economic plans, project plans and personal career plans have ‘often gone off the right line’ to quote from the Glossary of the Selected Poems of Robert Burns.

 

This quotation seems appropriate for expatriates working in UAE, especially colleagues who have just taken up new appointments here following redundancy due to cut backs in the UK or elsewhere.  We quoted two cases in the last NEWSLETTER ie one consultancy cutting 130 of 180 staff and another having to cut a planned project team of 45 down to 5. 

 

So far we have had no response from anyone able to help an available graduate engineer with project co-ordination experience in mechanical and civil fields in Europe, USA, and UAE.  Another person having to seek a new post is a British graduate Architect who has been Project Manager, Business Consultant and client representative in UAE on projects exceeding Dhs5 bn in value, including 7 tower blocks, 2500 villas, plus commercial and design developments.  Experience in UK has included Director of a Design Company and application of relevant Computer design software. Our HonSec will help pass such information around. 

 

General Economic Climate

The economic position worldwide, in Europe and here does not appear to be improving.  While no PCE UAE member has written in with specific data that might be included in a NEWSLETTER we have merely reviewed the headings, topics and contents in the local National  yesterday Thursday 2009 01 29 – and a few days previously - and quote some of these below – particularly some from the Davos Summit from which we had hoped to read of possible positive developments.

Page 1 (front) of the National 2009 01 29

·         “Grim truth  at Davos summit” – Crisis deepens – IMF says global economy will grind to a halt this year

·         “Aldar profits up but outlook a challenge” – property developer stopped selling in fourth quarter

-          Comments in the above article included

-          Annual profit for year jumped 77.5% to Dhs 3.4bn ($US 926m)

-          Earnings in the last quarter fell 89% to Dhs 8.4m

-          2009 will be a challenging year 

-          Aldar has lost 79.5% of its share value since January 01 last year

-          Unlike many developers in Dubai, Aldar has yet to announce changes in payment plans and construction schedules BUT

-          Aldar Laing O’Rourke, a joint venture with UK contractor company, said that it was laying off between 200 and 250 skilled staff out of 1900.

Page 04

·          Commodities “Oil weighs heavily on the Gulf share markets”

-          Despite moves to diversify in sectors including tourism, heavy industry and financial services

-       Oil prices dropped from $140 to $40 and share prices followed roughly the same pattern

Page 09

·          “Business leaders’ confidence plunges” – Hopes for quick V-shaped recovery fade

-          Only 21% of chief executives expect to boost revenues in next 12 months, down from 50%

-          “Unemployment on the rise”

-          The article quoted % of unemployment in selected industrial countries eg

·          Country                                  2009                       2008                                       2007

·          Spain                                                                     13.4%                                    8.6%

·          France                                                                     7.9%                                     7.8%

·          US                                                                             6.7%                                    4.7%

·          UK                                                                             5.9%                                    5.0%

and Scotland on Sunday” (SoS) quoted  “stated “Scottish jobless to rise by 88% this year - ‘It is a very bleak forecast’

Scotland                                                8.9%(Est)                 5.7%   

The same newspaper had a heading referring to the fact that Atkins the largest British Management and Engineering Consultancy planned to make at least 226 staff redundancies in Scottish and other UK offices“.

The UK Daily Telegraph dd 2009 01 29  on page 23 had the heading “Job losses avalanche to sweep across all regions”  - many of these relate to the financial and retail sectors but impact Engineering.       

 

Also, the ICE’s monthly magazine “ICE International” while including a full page advertisement for “Careers in Construction Event’  London 2009 03 03 had only one page with two block advertisements for only 5 jobs and these were in UK, Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia.  It had on page 6 an article headed:

“Property downturn hits construction market in Dubai” and on pages 9 to 11 an interesting article on the Sheikh Zayed Bridge to Abu Dhabi Island with the sub title :

’Engineers claim that Abu Dhabi’s unique Sheikh Zayed Bridge is the most difficult ever built thanks to its complex and irregular structural form’  Sounds similar to difficulties at the Sydney Opera House.  It is now some years since PCE UAE arranged briefings and visits to the site works for the bridge approach roads now completed..  

 

With the average level of unemployment heading for 10% the only consoling factor is that 90% will still have jobs – but these will be less secure and may not have expected perks

 

Page 10  of the National dd Thursday 2009 01 29

·          “Economy//Employment” – “Rising number of jobless may start another crisis”

-       What is good for one is not necessarily good for all, especially when a crippled financial system is involved

-       So it is with the swelling wave of job cuts around the world, including about 76 000 announced on Monday alone.

      -         It makes sense for individual companies to retrench in response to the down turn

      -         The paradox of unemployment is closely related to the paradox of thrift identified by John Maynard Keynes.  The economist worried that sensible cutbacks in spending from many worried households would lead to lower production, higher  unemployment, lower wages and more worried households.

Page 11

·          “Crisis of confidence hits major economies” – World Economic  Forum begins under a shadow

     -          The current situation is something more than a financial and economic crisis            -       T

·          “Wealth funds play it safe”

-               “Sovereign Wealth Funds (SWF) are likely to avoid major investments for at least six months as the global financial crisis plays out” - and Abu Dhabi SWF is the world’s largest!

 

A few days ago The National had the Business Section Headings

·          “Expat job losses threaten growth” – Cuts may lead to population outflow

-       UAE not headed to a recession but may post single digit growth this year, says official

-          Unemployment is one of the major threats to the economy as layoffs spread from the property and financial services to other sectors.

Page 05   ‘The Emirates’

·          “Finance sector moves to stop the brain drain” – skilled expats needed to ‘turn the economy’

-          Analysts believe a long term visa system would be better at preserving talent pool            

-          In the light of what is going on it would be far better to implement a visa system like the ones in Singapore and Hong Kong, where people can remain in the country between jobs and if they are renting.

The Engineering Sector would no doubt wish to do the same.  PCE UAE is a relatively small part of that sector.  The government departments deal with Chambers of Commerce and UAESE which include all registered Consulting and Contracting firms and national and expatriate individuals.  They do not all recognise British Engineering Council qualifications of CEng, IEng, EngT far less corporate membership of over 50 British EC licensed Professional Engineering Institutions (PEI) and Professional Affiliates (PA).

 

 

Projects and Appointments

The above quotations present a depressing but challenging scene.  However there are encouraging aspects.

For example, The National Business Section on the 26^th had the heading

·          “Go-ahead for $3.5bn oil projects” – ADNOC awards expansion contracts –

·          Three on-shore fields to be developed to increase production capacity by 30%

·          “Contracts placed for Taweelah Power and Desalination plant”

 

While the National does not handle many recruitment advertisements like Gulf News, Khaleej Times and  Gulf Today plus web pages,  it did have four A3 pages in a Career Supplement yesterday with three of these pages devoted to vacancies – most requiring degrees, but none specifying EC Chartered Membership

Summary - 3 Pages, 8 display advertisements with 38 specific posts in Abu Dhabi, Dubai and elsewhere including Oman and other Middle East Countries. These display advertisements varied in size and content eg

1.       First jobs page - full page (above A3) headed “We are still hiring” had 10 specific jobs all requiring management graduates with one specifying MBA and one a Graduate in Electrical Engineering. 

2.       The second jobs page had two other advertisements about A4 size, one of which had 5 vacancies in Abu Dhabi, Al Ain, Jebel Ali or Doha..  While these covered Project Management and Marketing in a technical area not one specified the need for a technical degree, far less any other technical qualification.  The other advertisement was for three college courses to Degree, Higher Diploma and Traffic Management.

      3    The third page had 5 roughly A5 sized advertisements

1.    One of these was by Emirates Airline Dubai, for one job in Abu Dhabi,

2    One for three web design related jobs all requiring graduates from a reputed (sic) university and                      minimum of five years UAE experience,

3   One for three jobs as Project Managers, Site Engineers, Senior Technicians possibly in UAE or other Gulf countries and Egypt.  These specified respectively 1) BSc or equivalent or Project Management (PMI) training, 2) Diploma in Mechanical or Electrical Engineering etc or 3) vocational school plus 7 years relevant experience.

4         The fourth advertisement had two jobs 1) Construction Manager which called for a BE in Civil Engineering from a reputable European / American University plus minimum of 10 years experience mainly in the Gulf. and 2) Landscape Architect which called for an Engineering Degree and minimum of 10 years design experience in Horticulture /Landscaping.

5         The last advertisement, again about A5, had 14 vacancies for Engineers and others in oil support services.  All but one specified the need for a degree in various disciplines including Petroleum Engineering (4), Civil/Electrical/Mechanical Engineering (1), Geophysics (4), Business Administration/Finance  (2) or Materials Management (1) etc.  Rounding off with “Candidates from Abu Dhabi are preferred to apply”  

 

Not one of these advertisements called for CEng, IEng, EngT (Nor  PE or Ing etc) which stresses the need for more effective marketing of such qualifications and UK-SPEC which all PCE UAE members are obligated to do..

 

Professional qualifications

Despite the above scenario it must be appreciated that any employer who has received many applications for one post and finds two or more candidates equally competent in many attributes is likely to employ the one which has shown discipline to achieve his academic qualification plus a professional qualification which has an obligation for the individual to undertake Continuing Professional Development (CPD)

 

For these and other reasons we have PCE UAE with regular lectures and Professional Review Preparation leading to CEng, IEng or EngT via corporate membership of an appropriate  Professional Engineering Institution (PEI).  PCE UAE is currently arranging CPR Interviews for CEng IMechE applicants and others.

 

For this reason also we invited members to select and weight topics of choice for our sessions. The HonSec received no feedback sheets.  However we had about 95% response from the forty or so of those who attended two main lectures in Abu Dhabi and Dubai in January. 

 

The top ten topics of interest are listed in order below.  We aim to include some of these in programme events in 2009

1.                    Construction Management

2.                    Project Management

3.                    Design Principles and Practice

4.                    Standards and Codes of Practice

5.                    Materials Management Specifications & Standards

6.                    Foundations, Dredging & Piling

7.                    Management Delegation

8.                    Time Management

9.                    Claims & Arbitration

10.                 Water & Waste (Power & Desalination)  

11.                 Financial Controls

12.                 Interim Certificates & Payments

13.                 Energy Power, Petrochemical & Process Plants

14.                 Marine Works

15.                 Management Motivation

16.                 Construction Equipment (Manufacture & Operation)

One topic has already been implemented ie Management Delegation selected last Tuesday at the PRP meeting at Ghantout when about 20 attended including 4 Chartered Engineer Fellows of 5 PEI volunteering to act as mentors.  Others included prospective CPR candidates for CEng via IMechE, IStructE and ICE later this year plus one newly appointed CEng via ICE who described his route to registration.

Regards, Alister                                                                                                                                   UAE

Er Alister I M Macmillan, Chair PCE UAE                                                                                        2009 01 30

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