COVER STORY
GCC
Call for Shake-up of MENA Project Delivery
COLLABORATION SORELY NEEDED
P
roject delivery in the Gulf Cooperation Council region would benefit greatly from collaboration, and stakeholders need to think innovatively to make it work, according to specialists operating in the region. Speaking at a seminar hosted by Middle East business intelligence consultant MEED, industry specialists spoke about how project delivery could be refashioned in the GCC region, specifically through collaborative forms of contracting. Sean McQue, operations director at Dubai-based ALEC Engineering & Contracting, saw collaboration as a mindset. “It’s not necessarily the words written down in a contract,” he said. Key things such as being clear
BY CARLY FIELDS
on responsibilities and risk apportionment and making sure that the right behaviors are incentivized can go a long way. “Trust doesn’t exist because you write it somewhere; it’s developed over time. You learn to trust people because of the way in which you interact with them and the way that they behave – and that comes from all sides.” Raymond Hector, director – commercial contracts, procurement at Abu Dhabi real estate specialist Aldar Properties, said that collaboration works well for large complex infrastructure projects. He added that while there might not be formal agreements on collaboration in place in the GCC, that does not mean that collaboration is not taking place.
“You may not see collaboration in a formal sense because when you’re establishing good working relationships, there doesn’t necessarily need to be a formal contract naming something as an alliance for it to work.” For collaboration to work there must be trust and aligned goals and objectives, Hector said. “Alliances allow us to continue to be sustainable, allow us to continue to be innovative, and allow us to deliver quality products to the market.”
GCC MATURITY CHALLENGES
Faisal Butt, project delivery director at The Red Sea Development Co., said his company procured about US$4 billion in contracts in 2020 and plans to continue contracting at that
The Red Sea Development Co. is expecting to match 2020’s US$4 billion contracts procurement value in 2021. CREDIT: THE RED SEA DEVELOPMENT CO.
18 BREAKBULK MAGAZINE www.breakbulk.com
ISSUE 1 / 2021
