The Roads and Highways Department was founded in 1962 as an offshoot of the C&B Department. The Department is responsible for the construction and maintenance of the major road network of Bangladesh.
Since the Department was founded the size of the major road network in Bangladesh has grown from approximately 4,500 kms to the present network of about 21,000 kms. The Department is headed by a Chief Engineer who is supported by a number of Additional Chief Engineers. The Department is also responsible for an annual budget of approximately Taka 2,985 crore of which about Taka 2,400 Crore is from the Annual Development Budget and Taka 300 crore from the revenue budget in financial year 2005-06. The total number of personnel in the Department is almost 20,000.
The goal of the Roads and Highways Department is:
“The Roads and Highways Department is able to provide the People of Bangladesh with a safe, cost effective well maintained road network”.
and the purpose of the Roads and Highways Department is:
“The Roads and Highways Department has a sustainable capacity to plan, manage and deliver its full range of responsibilities in respect of the main road and bridge network and to be accountable for these duties”.
The Assets of the Roads and Highways Department have been conservatively estimated at Taka 37,000 crore of which by far the largest proportion is the value of about 21,000 kms of road and about 15,000 bridges.
These assets are probably the greatest asset of any organisation in Bangladesh and maintaining their value is vital to its economy. This places a great responsibility on the Roads and Highways Department.
In order to fulfil the objectives of the RHD the strategies of the various wings and zones must be fully implemented so that the outputs from the wings and zones contribute directly to the objectives and vision of the Department.
Any Vision of the future for the Roads and Highways Department must imagine an organisation that is capable of fulfilling the objectives stated in the previous section.
The Vision set out below is a statement of the various concepts, systems and procedures which are to be developed in the Roads and Highways Department in the near future.
The future Roads and Highways Department will be a better, stronger organisation which is service orientated, concentrating on providing a high quality safe service to the travelling public. The Department organisation structure will be modified to better reflect the present needs.
Personnel should be proud of their organisation and have a strong esprit de corps. Existing Government restrictions on recruitment will dictate future personnel numbers and it will be necessary to concentrate on the core activities of planning, setting standards, procurement and monitoring, whilst some other functions may be outsourced. Professional staff may be encouraged to spend a period on deputation with the private sector as part of their personal development. Specialists will be developed in a number of areas and postings will be made in a coordinated and planned manner. All personnel will receive appropriate job related and CPD training organised by the RHD training centre.
As the major highway network is now virtually complete the emphasis for funding should, during the next few years, change from development to maintenance. The Department will make wider use of private funding for roads and bridges including the use of a road fund. Maintenance and rehabilitation budgets will be based on the outputs of the HDM system. The RHD equipment hire pool should be allowed some budgetary flexibility in order to operate on a commercial basis.
The new RHD Contract Documents will be fully implemented and Design Standards will be developed and implemented. Quality will be enforced on all projects, not just foreign aided schemes. A variety of appropriate maintenance systems and procedures will be implemented. Greater use will be made of local consultants for survey, design and supervision. Monitoring and reporting systems will be improved with emphasis on physical progress and quality in addition to financial performance.
Equipment and Ferries will be operated under revised management systems leading to an improved service to customers. New and rehabilitated equipment will be hired out to contractors on commercial terms through plant pools operating on commercial systems.
Greater emphasis will be given to the issues of Safety and Environment. Road safety engineering improvements will be implemented, including new road signs and markings. Site safety procedures will be developed and implemented. Environmental and Resettlement guidelines will be prepared and implemented.
Many issues must be addressed if the objectives and vision are to be achieved. In the following paragraphs a number of the Key Issues are highlighted. The principal activities of each Wing and Zone must give due consideration to these issues.
The proposed new structure for RHD consists of five Headquarter Wings/Zones and seven Field Zones, each headed by an Additional Chief Engineer who reports Directly to the Chief Engineer. In addition two ACEs will be assigned to manage foreign aided projects one for World Bank Projects and one for Asian Development Bank Projects.
The current sanctioned staff of the Department totals 9,331 comprising 573 Class I, 773 Class II, 4,759 Class III and 3,226 Class IV personnel. Out of this total figure there are currently about 2,800 vacant posts all excepting about 150 of which are from Class III and Class IV staff. These figures for sanctioned staff however mask the fact that there are currently about 12,000 ‘temporary’ (work charged, muster roll and casual staff) employed by the Department giving a total of about 18,000 staff currently engaged. Because of the Government restrictions on recruitment of Class III and Class IV staff and the total ban on recruitment of temporary staff most staff are now over 40 years of age and there is an increasing rate of retirement which should result in major changes in staff numbers during the next 5-10 years.
The work of the Department is becoming ever more complex and there is a now an urgent need for specialists in many areas of operation. Specialists may be either from non engineering disciplines with appropriate education and experience (e.g. resettlement, law and finance) or in certain cases may be engineers who have undergone special training for a particular post (eg HDM, road safety, project management). Specialist posts have been identified as part of the details of the reorganisation. Some specialists are in high demand (eg IT personnel) and many engineers are not keen to be posted into specialist posts which appear unattractive compared with field postings. The strategy for RHD is to introduce systems to assist with attracting and retaining specialists.
There are many support staff in the Department but there is a shortage of skilled and experienced administrative support staff. During the past few years technology has changed but little has been done to develop those support activities which are essential to the efficient operation of the Department. Training and development of support staff is an important aspect of the RHD Strategy.
The Strategy is also to make a number of improvements in the designations and grades of some personnel. In particular some of the non engineering cadre officers (eg economics, arboriculture) should be brought into line with the equivalent engineering personnel in terms of grades and pay scales. There is also a long standing anomaly with the Assistant Research Officers (AROs) at the BRRL who are designated as Class III staff although their education and training indicates that they should clearly be Class II officers.
Planning
Until recently planning of the RHD annual programmes had to be based on perceived needs rather than on analysis. The RHD now has access to an extensive body of computerised data from surveys. This data can be used with inventory data, to determine the future budgetary needs for maintenance and rehabilitation. At the core of this system is the HDM that provides an economic ranking of options.
This data system is also linked to GIS mapping that facilitates the production of maps and the location of data.
These systems are now operational but there are some areas requiring further attention. A priority is to ensure that the road identification system is always used.
The value of the RHD planning system was demonstrated when flood damage surveys were carried out at very short notice in October 1998. As a part of the RHD Strategy, a more formal emergency response plan is now being built into the planning system.
Budgets
Under the old system, requests for the Revenue Budgets were generally based on the previous years budget with some allowance for inflation. Some variations occur from year to year to meet specific requirements.
The Annual Development Budget is based on requests for funding from the field Zones and priorities perceived by the Ministry, RHD Headquarters and donors. Development projects are processed through a system established by the Planning Commission.
The Revenue Budget is largely expended on Routine and Periodic Maintenance of roads, bridges and buildings. In addition it is used to fund operations and maintain equipment and ferries. The RHD annual Revenue Budget is currently of the order of Taka 250 crore per annum. The ADP Budget, is largely allocated to upgrading, rehabilitation and new development works. Some of these items may be considered as periodic maintenance. The ADP budget is currently of the order of Taka 1,150 crore (US$230m).
The tools are in place to enable rational planning and budgeting of future maintenance and rehabilitation projects. Establishing procedures to enable this to take place efficiently are a priority if the objectives of this Strategy are to be achieved.
Maintenance
With the major road network now developed the priority for spending must shift from new construction to maintenance. If roads and bridges are not properly maintained the massive asset value of RHD roads and bridges will not be protected.
As part of the RHD Strategy, the execution of maintenance works includes an expanded periodic maintenance requirement that will create a major new demand for the larger local contractors. It is estimated that on the national and regional highway network, about 700 km of thin overlay or other bitumen surface treatment should be undertaken each year.
1. Maintenance practices will have to be upgraded to cope with the increased demand. Contracts for major machine based periodic maintenance (overlays and bitumen surface treatment) will be required for improved National and Regional roads. Periodic maintenance on other roads could remain under small-scale contractors using improved labour-based methods.
2. Works programmes must be closely monitored. Reporting should be standardised and acted upon. Reports should highlight physical progress and quality not just financial expenditure.
3. Quality of all works must be ensured so that the product fulfils the design criteria and the overall objectives.
Standards
At the present time RHD is in the process of developing formal standards for the design, construction and maintenance of roads and bridges. The present system is inefficient as standards are revised for most major projects and inconsistencies can occur between projects. One important aim of this Strategy is that RHD standards are developed, published and enforced.
Surveys and Designs
Except for foreign aided projects surveys and designs are at present often not given the required attention. There is a particular concern with major bridges. Field divisions are reluctant to spend funds on survey and design and the RHD site investigation teams & design circles are thus required to produce results with insufficient resources.
An important feature of the Departments’ Strategy is therefore to obtain proper funding for designs and to ensure that all works are planned and designed in the prescribed manner.
Outsourcing of Services
Many highway departments do not carry out surveys or designs in house but contract these items out to the private sector. This has the advantage of allowing these departments to concentrate on their core activities of planning, setting standards, procurement and monitoring. It is also easier to deal with fluctuations in workload if services are contracted out. Separating the design and monitoring roles also provides a safeguard as the department then assumes a design checking function. With increasing demands on staff within the RHD, this Strategy supports the case for outsourcing a number of services.
The outsourcing of services needs to be done in a controlled, organised manner and needs careful thought and planning to be fully successful. The control and monitoring of external services needs skilled and capable RHD staff with a technical knowledge of the subject. In order to develop these skills, the RHD Strategy envisages that staff will require training and will be encouraged to spend periods working with local consultants under deputation.
Largely as a result of pressures to expand the road network and the scarcity of funds quality has in recent years not played a major role in construction works in Bangladesh. Whilst neglecting quality may give an appearance of rapid progress it is in fact a very wasteful use of funds. There are many excuses put forward for poor quality such as, small inexperienced contractors, shortage of equipment and no testing facilities. Most of these excuses do not stand up to scrutiny as high quality works have been achieved in Bangladesh using the smallest of contractors with the minimum of equipment and only very simple testing facilities.
Perhaps the greatest obstacle to quality and to the development of local contractors is the tendering system where bidders are required to quote a percentage above or below the estimated total cost based on a Schedule of Rates. This system is generally linked to the use of the outdated Form 2911. Experience has shown that even small contractors prefer a bidding system where they insert their own prices for the unit rates in the bill of quantities (often referred to as a FIDIC type contract). Under covenants with the World Bank form 2911 was to be discontinued for all contracts using Class ‘A’ and ‘B’ contractors by 1st July 1999. There appears little reason for its continuing use on other contracts.
The Departments’ Strategy is based on the fact that quality must become a key issue for all RHD work. Reporting, monitoring and payment systems should require proof of quality for all contracts.
Standard RHD contract documents for both construction and maintenance works have now been finalised and should be used for all contracts in the near future.
The RHD Mechanical Zone is responsible for 2,626 items of equipment. Of these items 1,486 are over 20 years old and 1,102 are out of service. The Mechanical Zone currently employs about 1,500 staff of which 219 are either class-1 or class-2 employees.
The annual revenue budget for equipment is normally about Taka 6 crore (US$1.2m) although in 1997/98 this was enhanced to Taka 17 crore (US$3.4m) to enable the purchase of some new items of equipment. The 1998/99 budget is Taka 12 crore (US$2.4m) for similar reasons. As a result 20 road rollers, 10 soil compactors and 6 mini asphalt plants were recently procured and a further 38 items of compaction equipment have been approved.
Computer systems have recently been installed within the Mechanical Zone. These have significantly improved the management of equipment, ferries, stores and spare parts.
Currently most mechanical equipment is allocated to field divisions and is under their day to day control. Equipment is hired to RHD contractors at well below com
1. A Government order to prevent the hire of other RHD equipment at the old departmental rates to contractors operating under FIDIC type conditions is to be issued soon.
2. A rehabilitation programme for 3-wheeled steel rollers will be implemented. These would then be added to the new pool and used for routine maintenance works.
3. A system of re-cycling hire charges for purchase of new equipment needs to be developed and approved by Government.
RHD ferries provide an essential public service in crossing the many un-bridged rivers in Bangladesh. Until recently there has been little investment in ferries and there is now a need to modernise the service with the introduction of more roll on–roll off craft to replace old uneconomic Unifloat and steel catamarans which are in poor condition.
1. Ferries must be operated on a more commercial basis.
2. A programme to rehabilitate about 35 of the roll on-roll off ferries all between 12 and 20 years old will also be required.
