Rajagopalan T S, Vice President – Projects, Adarsh Developers
It has been observed that every ₹1crore investment in a project generates employment of about 22,000 unskilled man-days, 23,000 skilled or semi-skilled man-days, and 9,000 managerial and technical man-days. With only 3% education in the country addressing the direct needs of the construction engineering and management fields, more aggressive teaching methodologies need to be adopted.
Opportunities & Challenges
The Infrastructure sector is responsible for propelling India's overall development with world-class infrastructure that includes bridges, dams, roads, urban development, power, ports etc. India requires investment worth ₹50 trillion (US$ 777.73 billion) in infrastructure by 2022 to have sustainable development in the country. Currently, the government is focusing on developing National Highways, Inland waterways, Interlinking of Rivers, Water for All, Housing for All and the Smart City Missions, which are all the drivers for the growth and is increasing investments from various FIIs and FDIs.
Challenges faced by the Construction Industries include:
Adarsh Palm Retreat Condominiums
Efficiency & Accountability
There are three categories of manpower involved in this industry: at the artisan level, the supervisory level and managerial level. It has been observed that every ₹1 crore, investment in a construction project, generates employment of about 22,000 unskilled man-days, 23,000 skilled or semiskilled man-days, and 9,000 managerial and technical man-days. With only 3% education in the country addressing the direct needs of the construction engineering and management fields, more aggressive teaching methodologies need to be adopted in our country.
Project Management softwares help in identifying and scheduling of the works, risk mitigation analysis, and quality monitoring, but the application is limited to the managerial level. In general, the construction manpower lacks basic hands-on training and skill development, which causes delays, unsafe working and defective workmanship, which ultimately results in cost-overruns.
Adarsh Palm Retreats
At Adarsh Developers, we provide regular training for our workers and supervisory staff and to identify the gaps and the latest trends, and impart the skills to our associates through in-house and external training programs. As a part of Quality Monitoring, we have stringent checklists, a daily onsite QC inspection team, weekly/quality safety reviews, and project quality monitoring software which aids in sequential inspection of the works as per the workflow procedures.
Project review is conducted both at the Project and Management levels to identify the gaps in progress and any decisions which affect the work. Budget controls are enforced by Master Cost Budgets before the commencement of the projects, allocating vendors for all specific works through individual work orders, monthly review of financial progress and comparison with planned vs actual, and finally compilation of project closure reports with reconciliation, including the expenses due to reworks and defect rectifications.
Artificial Intelligence & IoT
We have high scale of ongoing and upcoming projects planned for roll out during 2018-2020. These include Luxury Villas and Apartments, Mid Segment Apartments, and Affordable Housing.
The Infrastructure sector is responsible for propelling India's overall development with world-class infrastructure that includes bridges, dams, roads, urban development, power, ports etc. India requires investment worth ₹50 trillion (US$ 777.73 billion) in infrastructure by 2022 to have sustainable development in the country. Currently, the government is focusing on developing National Highways, Inland waterways, Interlinking of Rivers, Water for All, Housing for All and the Smart City Missions, which are all the drivers for the growth and is increasing investments from various FIIs and FDIs.
Challenges faced by the Construction Industries include:
- Liquidity crunch being faced though Banks and NBFC's, more-so-ever after the ILFS collapse and restrictions on various other NBFC's and raising NPA's by Banks
- Alleviated cost of materials. With various local regulations and environmental issues, raw material availability is continuing to be a challenge, resulting in spikes in cost of materials
- Despite availability of newer technologies, the costs involved in adopting them is still a challenge for small and medium companies and projects. Only, very large-scale projects are able to afford them
- Project Complexity: Involvement of various stakeholders with lack of detailing, specifications and availability of skilled manpower is causing serious imbalance and challenges in project management and coordination
- All newer projects are forced to adopt environmentally sustainable practices for the conservation of natural resources due to regulatory requirements and customer awareness
- With frequent natural calamities like floods, drought, and cyclone occurring at various parts of the country, rehabilitation efforts are causing huge investments and labor migration is impeding a project's progress in construction work.
Adarsh Palm Retreat CondominiumsEfficiency & Accountability
There are three categories of manpower involved in this industry: at the artisan level, the supervisory level and managerial level. It has been observed that every ₹1 crore, investment in a construction project, generates employment of about 22,000 unskilled man-days, 23,000 skilled or semiskilled man-days, and 9,000 managerial and technical man-days. With only 3% education in the country addressing the direct needs of the construction engineering and management fields, more aggressive teaching methodologies need to be adopted in our country.
Project Management softwares help in identifying and scheduling of the works, risk mitigation analysis, and quality monitoring, but the application is limited to the managerial level. In general, the construction manpower lacks basic hands-on training and skill development, which causes delays, unsafe working and defective workmanship, which ultimately results in cost-overruns.
Adarsh Palm RetreatsProject review is conducted both at the Project and Management levels to identify the gaps in progress and any decisions which affect the work. Budget controls are enforced by Master Cost Budgets before the commencement of the projects, allocating vendors for all specific works through individual work orders, monthly review of financial progress and comparison with planned vs actual, and finally compilation of project closure reports with reconciliation, including the expenses due to reworks and defect rectifications.
Artificial Intelligence & IoT
- Artificial Intelligence is at a slow pace in the construction industry but is expected to grow much faster than expected by the next decade. Opportunities and benefits are:
- Constant Design Optimisation through software to detail out all the behaviourial, manufacturing and executional aspects of utilities, services, joineries, windows / façade elements, structural fabrication works. BIM and Revit are currently being used in the industry, but their cost prohibits wider application
- Building commercial excellence and competitive edge by assessing past learnings and predicting consumer requirements and trends through analytics for Sales and Marketing strategies
- Risk Assessment and Mitigation through machine learning algorithms
- Cost optimization during procurement process through machine learning and computing wastages in design due to patterns
- Drones for face recognition of workers and to identify their health and safety aspects; surveying the works being carried out, especially in remote and unsafe areas; project monitoring through quality and quantity assessment and predicting the outcome
- Robot-assisted excavation, demolition, bricklaying, concreting, plastering, painting and manufacturing of doors/windows are prospects and would be a boon for companies facing shortage of skilled manpower
- 3 D printing of mock-ups and samples to simulate and pre-assess before wide scale adoption
We have high scale of ongoing and upcoming projects planned for roll out during 2018-2020. These include Luxury Villas and Apartments, Mid Segment Apartments, and Affordable Housing.
NBM&CW July 2019
