📍 WCCE President attends Spanish Congreso Nacional de Ingeniería Civil
In recognition of the contribution of the College to their initiatives, the presidents of both organizations have actively participated in the work of the Congress, being part of the Congress Honor Committee and attending it.
Carlos Mineiro, president of the World Council of Civil Engineers, participated in the inaugural session of the same, although he could not participate due to agenda problems in the internationalization session as initially proposed.
In addition to this, European Council of Civil Engineers' president, Aris Chatzidakis, participated in panel IV on conservation of the built heritage in which he shared his view on the challenges of those professionals whose mission is to conserve such heritage and who are facing an incomplete and inappropriate regulatory framework.
Colegio has thanked both organizations for participating with such high representation.
📆 World Engineering Day - March 4th, 2020
The 40th General Conference of UNESCO has adopted the resolution to proclaim 4th March of every year a World Engineering Day for Sustainable Development in November 2019.
The World Federation of Engineering Organizations (WFEO) proposed 4th March as World Engineering Day, the founding day of the Federation, as part of the 50th anniversary celebrations of the Federation in 2018. This is an opportunity to celebrate the important contributions of engineers and engineering to sustainable development and modern life.
💡 How many of us, civil engineers, are enough? - A column by Jorge Abramian, WCCE President Elect
Suppose a country is expecting a steady growth for several years due, for instance, to an increase in the prices of its exports. What can limit that growth? Certainly, when the economic cycle is favorable, a country could increase its GDP to a limit given by several boundary conditions: aptitude and abilities of the labor force, availability of energy supply, industrial capacity utilization, logistics and transportation infrastructure, and financial strength, to name a few. As a growing country requires more infrastructures, the number of civil engineers available to design and build the necessary works also becomes one of the key factors to guarantee development. Then, how many civil engineers are required to keep up with the growth? Or, in other terms, how many civil engineers should be added to the market each year? Difficult to measure, these questions remain unanswered, but this paper, through the collection of data from 38 countries, provides a perspective to the problem.
🏆 World Civil Engineering Olympiad - A WCCE initiative
The World Civil Engineering Olympiad - WCEO aims to bring civil engineering into secondary schools and colleges, drawing their interest to become civil engineers. Similarly to other disciplines’ International Olympiad schemes (Mathematics, Biology, Chemistry, Physics or Economics), WCEO Organizing Committee has designed a set of events regarding several areas of expertise within the scope of the practice of civil engineering. Such initiative was presented during WCCE’s 14th General Assembly held in Lisbon in September 2019, becoming endorsed to be replicated globally. On such grounds, WCCE has published WCEO's competition guidelines to foster the competition globally and make kids become aware of the role of civil engineers worldwide.
💧📖 Managing Floods and droughts - A WFEO monograph
This monograph deals with the first of the topics, “Drought and flood management: Best practices and engineering contribution” and has been prepared based on the reference documents in these matters and the contributions made by the members of the organizations that They are listed in the authorship section of the report and contributions.
WCCE subscribes WFEO's Declaration on climate emergency
The World Federation of Engineering Organizations (WFEO), following its 2019 General Assembly in Melbourne, and in the frame of the COP25 held this week in Madrid, has expressed its deep concern on the matter of climate emergency.
WFEO has summarized its position and commitment to act quickly through a Declaration on Climate Emergency in the following languages: English and Spanish.
WCCE agrees to subscribe such Declaration and encourages all its member organizations sign this Declaration and coordinate jointly with WFEO global communication campaign to raise awareness on the immediate and long-term consequences of climate change, and the need to support innovative technologies to face them, and build resilient infrastructures and communities.
President Mineiro declares "WCCE is fully aware that our represented organizations and professionals are already committed to provide inclusive and resilient communities through the planning and design of resource-efficient infrastructures throughout its life cycle compliant with society's needs and its environment."
According to WFEO Environment Committee Chair, Davide Stronati (U.K): “Engineers have always stepped up to the challenge to find solutions to societal needs. Climate change is one of the biggest issues humanity and the environment are facing now and in the foreseeable future. WFEO will strive together with more than 30 million engineers we represent in finding solutions to combat climate change and to create resilient communities that will leave no one behind.”
WFEO President, Prof. Gong Ke (China) declared “Facing the ever pressing challenge of climate change, engineers and engineering organizations are in action. Realizing that engineering is the key to sustainable development, WFEO and its members are working hard, among many others, to build engineering capacity of climate change mitigation and adaptation especially in developing and small island countries, we are mobilizing engineers worldwide to implement SDGS in engineering practices to reduce carbon and GHG emission and enhance resilience of human settlements and infrastructures, and we strive constantly to engage more women engineers to play their irreplaceable role in climate actions. It is our engineers to turn the ideas to action and to turn the goals to reality.”
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