Speakers on the second day of an international seminar here, Saturday, observed that a long term programme should be taken to retrofit existing important vulnerable buildings phase by phase to make Bangladesh earthquake resilient.
Technical and financial assistances from development partners may be accepted and attractive financing schemes may be taken in this regards, they observed.
Retrofitting is a Japanese technology that could be used to make a vulnerable building earthquake resistant without demolishing it and usually it costs 30 to 40 percent of the new construction cost of the targeted building.
Project for Capacity Development on Natural Disaster Resistant Techniques of Construction and Retrofitting for Public Buildings (CNCRP), a technical cooperation project between Public works Department (PWD) and Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) organized the two-day international seminar “Seismic Design, Retrofitting and Good Practices of Building Construction for Safer Cities” at Radisson Blu Water Garden Hotel in the capital.
During the second day of the seminar, three technical sessions chaired by Vice Chancellor of Asia Pacific Professor Dr Jamilur Reza Chowdhury, President of the Institute of Engineers, Bangladesh, Professor Dr M Shamim Z Bosunia and Managing Director of Design, Planning and Management Consultants Ltd Engineer M A Sobhan were held.
In the sessions, experts from Bangladesh, Japan, China, Turkey, India, Indonesia and Nepal shared their experiences on the situations of seismic assessment and retrofitting of buildings in their respective counties.
Dr Jamilur Reza Chowdhury urged the architects to avoid their present tendency to eliminate beams, keep ground floor open and remove lintel as these three factors increase vulnerability of the buildings.
In his paper titled – “Seismic Assessment and Retrofitting of Building:
Bangladesh Situation” Additional Chief Engineer, PWD and Project Director of CNCRP Abdul Malek Sikder said the constraint of Bangladesh is that very limited number of engineers are having adequate knowledge and experience of seismic assessment and retrofit design of existing building. Non availability of building design and construction document of existing buildings is another major problem here,” he mentioned.
He said Public Works Ministry should prepare and promulgate the standard of structural assessment, retrofit design and construction of existing buildings.
“PWD should undertake a new project with assistance from friendly donor countries to acquire the technology of seismic assessment and retrofitting especially for existing unreinforced masonry buildings through providing training and financial assistance,” he said.
