Achieving sustainable buildings: the importance of stakeholder engagement

Dubai, UAE: Construction of any building, especially that involves a large project or a Green Building, requires multiple stakeholders to come together to collectively go through the process. However, often, issues of disengagement and lack of communication and coordination amongst the stakeholders has been brought to the fore during discussions at forums on constructing sustainable buildings.

“True sustainability is a result of an integrated design and development approach that involves all stakeholders, particularly the developer, from the beginning to the end of the project development,” says Sougata Nandi, CEO of 3e Advisory. “To an extent, some of the Green Buildings that have come up in the UAE, or are being developed, have engaged, or are engaging, a multitude of stakeholders at the design development phases. While the Green Building certification programmes have largely necessitated the practice, the true purpose or benefit is yet to be fully realised.”

He continues to say that there is a need to engage not just the stakeholders directly involved with the project but also the “bigger” stakeholders that are indirectly involved in the individual building projects, such as the utilities, municipalities and the traffic departments. “Currently,” Nandi says, “their role is to ensure the design elements of the individual buildings follow the standards or regulations laid down, and to issue NOCs. A greater involvement of these entities will necessitate a genuine evolution of their Standard Operating Procedures, though, and may take a while.”

The prospect of projects ending just as planned initially and achieving sustainability goals has a greater chance when all stakeholders participate in the process.