French civil engineer’s view
Just closed its doors the International Construction Fair “Project Lebanon 2009”, organized by IFP at Biel Exhibition Center at Beirut, Lebanon.
Four days of meetings, conferences for some of us – all depending on aimed objectives. More than 30 French companies, some of them already present on the Middle East Market: construction, architecture, engineering, security, material manufacturing, etc. Four days under the whitish sky, between the heat and shadows of palm trees of the eternal city – Beirut.
A French pavilion was organized by the Regional Economical Service (SER – Ubifrance), in cooperation with two Chambers of Commerce – France-Lebanese, of Paris. Really, the pavilion was organized with a care and the purely French elegance, and the economic mission once again made miracles.
For sure, french enterprises show there interest for the Lebanese market. But is the environment of the market is favorable for the development of the French-Lebanese commercial relations? Of course, yes, but not for all domains of activity. And we observed this during the exhibition.
All the activities of building and civil engineering were more or less present on the show. As well all kind of visitors were there.
On my opinion, following activities are most current events for the Lebanon today. It is, first of all, the real-estate construction. The city of Beirut evolves permanently, in the Lebanon and the nearby countries the building is always actual activity. After real-estate, the arrangement of interior, or the decoration drew visitors’ attention. We were able to notice it by the interest of the public towards present exhibitors. Also all kind of products for comfortable life, products that are new for the Lebanese market. Such as air conditioning systems, supports for stone floors, etc.
As civil engineer, working in the construction of the transport infrastructure (bridges, tunnels) I have to notice, that, the work in this sector for companies, coming from outside, is complicated. Even if the transport infrastructure system in Lebanon is quite old and needs renovation, jobs are attributed for some years beforehand. The market is already defined and divided. But we had a chance to make discover our new, or, I can say, revolutionary technologies for infrastructure building to Lebanese public, and we hope to find an application for our quasi-universal tool.
It’s difficult to give a conclusion for the end of this marvelous construction show, or to say, like they say in fairy tales, “they lived happily ever after and built a lot of bridges”. The question “does Beirut want to build?” stays for the moment without concrete answer. Of course it wants, but to build what kind of structures?
Stanislav SIMONENKO
