NESPAK undertakes 3,900 dev projects in Pakistan, abroad

on 07/02/2019

NESPAK has successfully completed 45 years of its establishment and during such a period, it has undertaken 3,900 development projects within Pakistan and 37 other countries of the world with a cumulative cost of Rs 19,000 billion, stated Dr. Tahir Masood, Managing Director, NESPAK.
The foreign countries where NESPAK has extended engineering consultancy services are mostly located in the Middle East, Far East, Central Asia, and Africa.
In this way, NESPAK has placed the country on the export map of the world and is committed to providing multi-disciplinary engineering consultancy services with the highest level of professionalism and dedication.
Due to achievements of an organization like NESPAK, the country has achieved self-reliance in engineering consultancy, minimized dependence on foreign consultants and developed indigenous human resources.
Major projects undertaken by NESPAK during last five years include 969 MW Neelum Jhelum Hydropower Project, Mangla Dam Raising Project, 4800 MW RLNG-based Power Plants in Punjab, 747 MW Combined Cycle Power Plant, Guddu, Orange Line Metro Train Project, Metro Bus Projects in Lahore and Islamabad, Lahore Ring Road Project Southern Loop, CPEC Projects, Kachhi Canal Project, Lining of Distributaries and Minors in Sindh, Quick Impact Projects in North and South Waziristan Agencies, Reconstruction and Rehabilitation of Earthquake Affected Areas, Expo Centre Karachi, New Pakistan Secretariat Block in Islamabad, DHA schemes in Lahore, Peshawar, Gujranwala, New Islamabad International Aiport, Bacha Khan International Airport, Peshawar, On-Farm Water Management Project, Afghanistan, Raising of Wala Dam, Jordan, Roads in Najran Saudi Arabia and many more.
NESPAK was established in 1973 as a Private Limited Company of Consulting Engineers with the objectives to achieve self-reliance in engineering consultancy, develop indigenous engineering workforce, minimize the role of foreign consultants, create professional employment opportunities and operate at national and international level.
By the grace of Allah, these objectives have successfully been achieved. Now NESPAK stands fully self-reliant and its international stature is well established and recognized as one of the leading Consultancy Organizations of the world. It is the largest consulting firm in Pakistan and generates its own revenues from Consultancy Contracts. It is a financially sound professionally run organization with gross annual revenues up to Rs. 9.0 billion.
NESPAK started with professional staff strength of about 20 employees in 1973. It has now a total staff strength of around 5,000 employees, out of which over 3600 are qualified professionals which include 450 employees with M.Sc. and Ph.D. degree mostly from foreign universities.
Around 210 employees are deployed in the Overseas Offices. It has expertise in planning, design and construction supervision of multi-disciplinary projects in almost all engineering, architectural and town planning disciplines.
NESPAK is on the approved panel of consultants with over 17 international aid-giving agencies and has carried out projects for various donor agencies including the World Bank, Asian Development Bank, Islamic Development Bank, JICA, USAID etc.
NESPAK offers a broad spectrum of expert Consultancy Services ranging from conception to completion and operation of development projects. The scope of these services covers pre-feasibility and feasibility studies, surveying and mapping, investigations, design, tender and contract documentation, construction/installation supervision, contract management/evaluation, and post-construction services. It provides specialized services in the fields of Power and Mechanical; Water Resources; Agriculture; Architecture and Planning; Communications, Airports, Ports, Harbours; Environmental and Public Health Engineering; Engineering for Industry; Heating, Ventilation, and Air-conditioning; Information Technology and Geographical Information System.
NESPAK has its headquarters in Lahore, with two major offices in Islamabad and Karachi and regional offices in Peshawar and Quetta, besides a large number of project offices throughout Pakistan.
Internationally, NESPAK has permanent offices in Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar, Afghanistan, and the UK.
The Company is managed by a Board of Directors comprising a Chairman, a Managing Director and 11 Directors. The day-to-day functions of the Company are looked after by the Managing Director who is assisted by Vice Presidents/Division Heads. Various Divisions headed by Vice Presidents/ General Managers are broadly divided into project management and specialty groups. A total of 10 project management divisions are responsible for management of projects and five specialty divisions are centers of excellence for various disciplines.
Quality Management System (QMS) has always been given utmost importance in NESPAK. Quality is achieved through maintaining the ISO 9001 based QMS, as well as continuously enhancing and upgrading the quality of our services by carrying out necessary changes in our work practices/ procedures, as documented in the Quality System Manual. NESPAK has recently achieved a major milestone by fulfilling the requirements to acquire certifications of ISO 14001: 2015 Environmental Management System (EMS) and OHSAS 18001: 2007 Occupational Health & Safety Standards for the Company and subsequently went through their Audits. The ISO 9001: 2015 Certification of NESPAK, demonstrates its commitment to continuous improvements through a dynamic Quality Management System.n

Discovering Abilities & Lifetime Opportunities for Graduating Engineers MUET organizes DIALOGUE’19

on 07/02/2019

Faculty of Electrical, Electronics, Computer Engineering MUET Jamshoro organized a unique mega-event, DIALOGUE’19 (Discovering Abilities & Lifetime Opportunities for Graduating Engineers).
Chief Organizer of the event Prof. Dr. B.S. Chowdhry, also acknowledged as Distinguished National Professor and IEEEP Vice Chair, Hyderabad Centre highlighted the importance of the event.
Mr. Chowdhry said that when students reach in final year, they acquire many technical skills but they also need strong entrepreneurship skills to solve the problems of society and industry.
The first speaker of the event Mr. Tahir Chaudhry, Chief Executive, Falcon Engineering, Founding Member & Chair Industry – Academia Linkage, Open Source Foundation of Pakistan gave a talk on “Going for Gold: Steps towards Becoming Entrepreneur” followed by talk of Engr. Irfan Ahmad, Chairman IEEEP Karachi Centre, and Energy Consultant and Director of “The Energy Grid Ltd” on “Job requirements and opportunities for Engineers: What needs to be done?” Two more talks on “Global Opportunities at Your Door Step” including current & future trends in technology from IoT, Al to Deep Learning, mentoring and counseling for research and higher education opportunities.
Given by Dr. Shahid Qamar Professor/Research Scientist, University of Louisville, USA, and Dr. Ali Kashif Bashir, former Researcher, Osaka University, Japan.
These talks were powered by US-PAKISTAN Knowledge Corridor, Higher Education.
The final talk of the day was given by Engr Naveed Ansari, IEEEP VP (South) and MD Systek (Pvt) Ltd “Opportunities for Graduating Engineers”.
In his brainstorming speech Prof Dr. Tauha Hussain Ali, Pro Vice Chancellor appreciated all the speakers who traveled different parts of the country and abroad for sharing their experiences and motivating students how to become their own boss.
The unique thing of the program was three cash awards to final year Electrical engineering position holders students sponsored from the industry.
Cheque 1st prize of Rs 100000/ sponsored by Fast Cables Ltd was given to Ms. Aneeqa Sattar D/o Abdul Sattar Channa, second prize of Rs 50,000 sponsored by Saphire Textile Mills was given to Ms. Noor Jahan D/o Muhammad Arshad Khan, 3rd Prize of Rs 25000/- sponsored by Executive Club Nooriabad Industrial Association was given to Mr. Awesh Kumar S/o Chandoo Menghwar.
There was also project competition and 1st three winners were awarded cash prizes as well by the Chief Guest.
The Chief Guest of the occasion Dr. Rana Abdul Jabbar Khan, President IEEEP and GM TSG NTDC appreciated efforts of MUET for taking many efforts for the professional development of students.
He said MUET has broken the record of getting huge IEEEP student membership for more than 400 students. It has created a new history. It was participated by engineers and professionals from NTDC, GENSO, HESCO, K-electric, Faculty members and students. At the end a Vote of Thanks was given by Prof Dr. Abdul Sattar Larik, Secretary, IEEEP Hyderabad Local Centre. n

An effort to improve presentation skills of young engineers

on 07/02/2019

The Institute of Mechanical Engineering (IMechE) NED Chapter organized ‘Speak Out For Engineering’ (SOFE) an event to improve communication and presentation skill of young engineers.
SOFE is an annual presentation competition for IMechE young members who get an opportunity to make presentations on any technical topic of their choice in front of a panel of judges assessing the entries and thus provide feedback.
The aim of the competition is to develop presentation/communication skills and being able to deliver a technical presentation to a primarily non-technical audience.
Students can present any technical topic of their choice be it a technical hobby or an interest, a work-related project or even something unique for the competition.
What SOFE is looking for, is enthusiastic people who want to develop their presentation skills.
Adeel Yaqoob and Asad Ali, Chairman IMechE, NED Chapter said: “The basic purpose of organizing events like SOFE is to improve presentation skills of young engineers who are generally technically strong but lacking presentation skills.”
Since they are unable to present themselves in the industry for their lack of ability to sell themselves to industry, IMechE organizes this International Presentation Competition every year.
The students are selected at university level and then sent to district levels before final selection for country level. The best speakers are sent abroad for the international competition. The funding is done by IMechE and the student does not have to pay even a single penny.
“IMechE is basically a UK-based society and has multiple chapters in different countries.
In Pakistan, it has three chapters; one is in DHA Suffa University, the other in NUST and the third in NED University of Engineering & Technology.
IMechE organizes different competitions internationally for the grooming of youth and young engineers.
The judges of the competition Mr. Hasan Ali and Saiyid Najam Rizvi said the major problem that our youth was facing was relating to communication which needs to be improved.
SOFE is a competition arranged every year to overcome communication problems in our students. The contestants are selected from all over the world for the final competition in Spain.
A lawyer by profession, he said he was an expertise in communication skills and thus SOFE judge. ‘It is very necessary for an engineer to develop his communication skills because only an engineer knows properly as to how a product has been developed and what are its pros and cons. Thus, an engineer has to present his work with industry and if he/she will be lacking in the presentation or communication skills they are doomed to face failure. So, events like SOFE should be organized to support our youth for the prosperous future of Pakistan.” (The writer is Co-Chairman IMechE – NED chapter)
Visit our YouTube Channel to watch full interviews: www.youtube.com.engineeringreviewER n

IEEEP’s 34th All Pakistan Students Seminar

on 07/02/2019

The Institution of Electrical & Electronics Engineers Pakistan (IEEEP) organized 34th All Pakistan Student Seminar in NED University of Engineering and Technology, Karachi on January 15, 2019.
Students from various universities of Pakistan running the undergraduate degree programs in Electrical, Computer & Software Engineering/Computer Science, Electronics, and Biomedical engineering participated in the seminar.
The students had already been advised to submit their research papers and posters.
As per tradition, three best papers each from undergraduate and postgraduate papers were awarded.
The best papers were shortlisted for IEEEP Multitopic Symposium to be held in February 2019.
IEEEP Running Trophy will be awarded to the university whose students will secure top position in Multitopic Symposium.
Muhammad Irfan Shaikh, Convenor IEEEP Fair said the educational institutions should also organize similar programs adding such initiatives would improve the linkage between academia and industry. Shaikh said the industry should welcome academia to train students and the teachers so that they know about the industry.
Chief Executive Officer, Rastek Technologies, Rafiq Ahmed Lakhani appreciated the moot and said organizing such seminars was very necessary. The purpose is to encourage students so that they propose better ideas and give better solutions to industrial problems of Pakistan. This will create better opportunities in the future for them for moving towards upcoming latest technologies.
Pakistan, he says is not suffering from working technical solutions but the issue is that the governments do not support such ideas. The students work day and night on the projects but the governments tax them rather than supporting them financially. Our laws are the major problems promoting ideas of our students. These laws should be improved.n

How Pakistan Steel Mills can be revived?

on 07/02/2019

Pakistan Steel Mills is the first and only integrated iron and steel making complex of Pakistan with a rated capacity of 1.1 million tons. It started its production in 1984 and achieved full capacity utilization in subsequent years up until 2004 and remained higher than 85 percent capacity in subsequent years. However, lack of funds for plant maintenance and absence of support resulted in a gradual reduction of production. There was a complete shutdown of the plant on 20 June 2015 due to gas disconnection by SSGC for nonpayment of gas bills.
The abrupt shutdown led to chilling of the Blast Furnace as well as hot metal mixer. At present most part of Blast Furnace and metal mixer are filled with untapped solidified charge.
As it stands now Pakistan Steel is terminally sick. However, if proper phase wise steps are taken then this sick unit stands a very good chance of revival.
The following recommendations are an outcome of an extended deliberation with highly experienced professional engineers who have played a pioneering role in the establishment of Pakistan steel with Soviet experts and some who have recently retired and have elaborated the current operational status of the Plant and Machinery.
The strategy being recommended is based on starting activities that can generate cash flow thus lessening the burden of much-needed capital investment. They are arranged in a sequence as under:

  1. Pakistan Steel consists of several production units related to main production stream and support products and services. Many of these units can be put into operation at their full capacity for using the products and services for state enterprises including defense and railways. Some of such units (which can start immediate operation) are Pakistan Steel Lubrication Limited (PSFCL), Central Maintenance Department (CMD), Section forming unit, galvanizing unit, refractory plant etc.
  2. Overhauling the Thermal Power Plant (TPP- TBS) and making it operational is amongst the priorities to offset the energy bill and be a source of revenue from the net metering contract with K-Electric.
  3. The next unit to operationalize are the Rolling Mills (HRM, CRM, and Billet Mill) that can at the start utilize 72,000 tons of slabs available and later switch to imported slabs and blooms. This operation alone can bring billions of rupees in profit to be re-injected into the capital repairs.
  4. The combined profits from PSFCL, CMD and Rolling Mills operation
    (long and flat products) can greatly help in the capital investment required for Revival of Pakistan Steel Mills.
  5. After all of the above, we should focus on 1st category maintenance of Blast Furnaces, Overhaul of Sintering and Coke Oven Plant and repair and maintenance of LD Converter and Oxygen Plant.
  6. Finally, it was recommended that the Metallurgical Training Center (MTC) and Institute of Material Science and Research (IMS&R) be immediately restarted for the training of manpower. Dawood University of Engineering & Technology can be a partner & collaborator for Pakistan Steel in manpower training. (Recommendations made at DUET, Karachi is a seminar titled as The Revival of Pakistan Steel Mills: Technical Due Diligence) n