Although the mining sector is currently buoyant, it is hoped that public sector spending on infrastructure will rise and stabilise - providing a firmer foundation for South Africa to maintain and develop the depth of its expertise in consulting engineering.
According to SRK Consulting managing director Andrew Van Zyl, recent years have been busy for the company due largely to its long history in the mining sector. However, it is really only a sustained and upward trajectory of growth that will secure South Africa’s vital skills base in the consulting engineering sector, argued Van Zyl.
“In any country, the quality of its consulting engineering industry relies on the steady growth of experience across multiple disciplines over decades, not just years,” he said.
“Here in South Africa, we have been struggling to generate and retain these skills; many specialisations are in high demand internationally, so we are also competing with other countries for these scarce skills.”
He pointed out that the cyclical nature of the mining industry tended to create challenges of its own, as demand for specialised consulting engineering input regularly fluctuates. It was therefore important that other sectors of the economy were also vibrant, so they could help even out the highs and lows of the commodity cycle.
“For consulting engineers like SRK, recent years have been very busy on account of buoyant commodity prices even creating scarcity in some disciplines,” he said. “At the same, though, the construction and infrastructure sector has been subdued – along with its demand for consulting engineering services.”
