Engineering: issues, challenges and opportunities for development ...

ENGINEERING: EMERGING ISSUES AND CHALLENGESused in isolation. It is only when it becomes broadly applied andinteracts with other technologies that its true potential can beexploited. In these circumstances, engineering education mustrecognize the importance of synthesis and design as well as moreconventional analysis. But it must also recognize the importanceof the iterative approach (feedback) whether in design, in sustainabilityor in innovation.Researchers in technology would be well advised to addresscustomer and societal needs and market requirements and notjust research for research or technology’s sake. However, industrywould be better served if it sought out good and relevantresearch more positively, and if it developed more industry/academicpartnerships. Thereafter industry and academia togethershould treat the task of taking research into practice as a businessprocess to which the disciplines of good project managementcan and should be applied.Thus, a way ahead for both researchers and industrialists mightbe to ask in each case: What is the societal problem? What isthe technological challenge? What is the business driver? Howto define the research project? What are the findings (actual orpotential)? What are the potential applications? and, What isthe mechanism (business process) for advancing research intopractice? The process is iterative. The industrialist/businessmandefines the problem, the technological challenge sets theresearch agenda, but the research equally defines the technologicalpossibilities.If we are to advance research into practice it is not enoughfor governments, industry or research councils simply to sit injudgement on research proposals. They must actively seek outgood researchers and, through mutual discussion, develop programmesthat address societal needs. Engineers provide servicesto meet the needs of society and it is creativity that is our essentialcontribution. The Latin ingenerare means ‘to create’.The engineering community in the third millennium needsto create a new vision, goal and strategy for itself. Though it isimpossible to predict what the world will be like even in 2020,that vision should include a genuine improvement in the qualityof life for all as well as long-term environmental, social andeconomic sustainability. The goal of engineering would thenbe to contribute towards achieving that vision, with its strategyfocusing on the development of whatever structures, skills andtechnologies are needed.67