Standardization of procurement: National or international?

The ISO has issued a Draft International Standard on construction procurement and the British Standards Institute is drafting a standard based upon this for use in the UK. Three questions arise from these observations. First, what kind of consultation processes would be adequate to ensure that such a standard meets the requirements of an industry as diverse as construction? Second, why would an international standard be inappropriate for use in a country like UK? Third, what sort of issues should such a standard seek to cover? There are strong precedents for process standards, such as quality assurance, design management and workmanship on building sites. So the idea of a standard on procurement is not unusual. Moreover, there are many differences in tendering and procurement practice that are wasteful and even collusive or illegal. These issues are explored with a view to offering insights and suggestions for guidance based on the experiences in UK. The research method is first-hand observation of the drafting committee who are dealing with the British Standard. As an example to test and inform the standardization concept, six different standard guidance documents on tendering procedures are compared. This reveals a significant degree of diversity, and based on this, nine stages for implementing a tendering procedure are derived.

Comparison of defects in houses constructed by owners and registered builders in Victoria 1988-1996

The lack of attention to quality control by house builders in the Australian State of Victoria has been a contentious issue for more than two decades. Ina an attempt to improve the quality of housing, various mechanisms such as voluntary and compulsory registration schemes have been adopted and discarded by industry-based organisations and government. While builders are encouraged to improve construction quality, little is known and published about the quality of housing produced by owner builders specifically during the seven year warranty period after construction is completed. With this in mind, this thesis presents research findings that compare the latent defects in houses built by owner builders with those of registered builders. Using inspection reports provided by Archicentre a sample of 1772 houses, of which 1002 were owner builders and 770 were registered builders

A question of continuing control -balancing building quality of housing and building codes

The Building Code of Australia seeks to establish “nationally consistent, minimum necessary standards of relevant, health, safety (including structural safety and safety from fire), amenity and sustainability objectives efficiently”. These goals are laudable – but where are the goals of quality and maintenance, which are also an essential part of achieving adequate and continuing health and safety for the built environment?

Defects such as dampness, settlement and cracking, staining, wood rot, termite damage, rusting, and roof leakage are common enough to suggest that there are still issues with building quality in housing. They are caused by a combination of initial poor workmanship and poor quality materials and latterly by poorly executed or inadequate maintenance.

Local architecture, developed over many years of trial and error, produce buildings linked to their climate and local materials (think of the typical “Queenslander” house). Today’s architecture imports technologies and materials from many differing countries and climates – that are not necessarily suitable for the location, nor is there necessarily the same quality control over the material quality and production. Inappropriate use and inadequate understanding of new materials and techniques can lead to the generation of further defects.

Whilst the building code contains provisions for initial-build material quality and workmanship, there is no continuing control over a house over its life span. Reliance is placed on advertising the need, for example, to employ qualified tradespeople; replace batteries in smoke detectors; and other good advice to help maintain housing to a minimum standard. Is this sufficient?

Mechanisms to make the transfer of knowledge to those who need to use it – be it the workforce or the houseowner – need to be improved. Should the building code be more visual and accessible in it’s content? Should the building code include provisions for maintenance? Should the building code require every house to have a “users manual” – much like a car? An extensive review of literature identifies the scale of the problem of poor quality housing and highlights some suggested causes – inadequate knowledge of the BCA by general housebuilders being one. However little work has been done to investigate what could be done to improve the situation. This work suggests that improvements to knowledge transfer would improve the quality of housing and a model of the knowledge transfer process is proposed, identifying those areas where the knowledge flows need to occur that would impact both the builders and users of housing.

A prospective study on building quality : enforcement of control in the Australian housing industry

The Australian housing industry is beset with quality issues with repeated building defects causing problems with customer satisfaction and housing performance. These defects are caused by a combination of initial poor workmanship and poor quality materials and subsequently by poorly executed or inadequate maintenance. These poor work practices increase the cost and maintenance of housing. The waste and rectification work generated by such practices means that the housing industry generally is not engaged with sustainability. Building Control is part of achieving quality of building output. Whilst the Australian Building Code has regulations for initial-build material quality and workmanship, there is no continuing control and effective enforcement over a house over its life span. Sustainability is not dealt with as a topic at all in the Building Code with only energy efficiency concerns regulated. Inadequate knowledge transfer, to the mainly small builders who produce the majority of Australia’s housing, is seen to be a key issue. Mechanisms to make the transfer of knowledge to those who need to use it need to be improved. Building regulations, for example, could be more visual and accessible in their content and small builders should be encouraged to update their knowledge and skills. This comparative research will guide industry service providers in improving their performance and suggest how overall housing quality can be improved (thereby reducing wasteful practices), by considering more appropriate mechanisms for knowledge transfer among industry service providers in the Australian housing industry.

Por uma teorização das organizações de produção artesanal: habilidades produtivas nos caminhos singulares do Rio de Janeiro

The purpose of this thesis is to support the argument that workmanship production centers don¿t represent just survival strategy of social groups marginal to economical structure. Workmanship organizations are productive schemes that survived, in a parallel way, to the industrialization process, although they don¿t have been considered by the organization theory. The knowledge reserve in administration, from the traditional approach to critical studies, increased concerns on industrial organizations and business arrangements. Nevertheless, it is possible to find in Teoria da Delimitação dos Sistemas Sociais, from Guerreiro Ramos, elements to comprehend workmanship organizations as: technology, scale and sustainability, cognition, space and relationship and time. The research methodology used was bibliographic, field and documental, regarding action-research. It comes to the conclusion that, at present time, to keep it as distinct productive schemes, workmanship organizations must be associated to tourism and culture. The production must be thematic, with territorial identity, creative and sustainable, by the management of local raw material.

Cidadania em transporte coletivo: o papel fiscalizatório da gerenciadora do sistema de transporte coletivo intermunicipal Urbano de Passageiros da Região Metropolitana da Grande Vitória

A structure transports system is very necessary to attending many reasons of urban dislocations. This structuration is composed by many complex elements, as such as refer to: physical elements (rodoviary network, vehicles, garages, transboarding terminals), human elements (operational and administrative workmanship) and the institutional elements (management and fiscalization). This last one, especially, is our approach in this study, focusing the functions as the fiscalization of public organization. The purpose of this study was identifies how the public organization develops the management the system of public transport for urban intercity users and how can contributes for users satisfaction, feeding back avaluations, even, giving new direction or reavaluation of the fiscalization function. The methodology sdopted to get expected solutions is exploratory survey, due the unidentified any studies with the same focus or approaching to the citizens expectatives solutions by public organism manager point of view. Also it was realized an explanation survey to complement the study giving wide comprehension for the other elements used by organization to obtain success in the relationship with users. A field survey and bibliographical was realized thru documental investigation to get informations about necessary foundamentation based conclusion.

Alavancagem como instrumento de estratégia operacional: o caso da obra de construção da nova sede da Assembléia Legislativa do Estado do Maranhão

Devido à grande competitividade do mercado atual, estão em vantagem competitiva aquelas empresas que conhecem profundamente seus resultados financeiros, para que a partir deste conhecimento seus gestores possam tomar decisões visando a maximização do lucro. Dentro deste pensamento, esta pesquisa trata da alavancagem como instrumento de estratégia operacional, para isso apresenta o estudo de caso de uma obra de construção civil, setor este cuja mão-de-obra é um significante insumo, cujos funcionários de produção trabalham horas extras, aumentando o lucro da empresa. O objetivo do presente trabalho é demonstrar como a alavancagem operacional pode ser utilizada como instrumento de estratégia operacional neste contexto. Quanto aos fins se trata de uma pesquisa descritiva e aplicada; quanto aos meios é bibliográfica, documental e de campo. Foi realizada na obra de construção da nova sede da Assembléia Legislativa do Estado do Maranhão que está sendo executada pela empresa Petra Construções Ltda na cidade de São Luís.

Estudo da fibra de coco como reforço em tijolo de solocimento

To take care of to the demand of the new constructions in the low income communities and to develop the production of a strengthened alternative brick with staple fibers of coconut, capable to contribute mainly with the recycling of the green and mature coconut in the urban and agricultural lexes, this research was developed, to confection bricks of soil-cement with coconut fiber. Ecologically correct material and of low cost, since the greenhouse use of or oven for burning will be manufactured without. The study it presents a set of tables and graphs that prove good indices found in the values of the density, water absorption, axial compressive strength and isolation term acoustics, with evidential results that make possible the production in industrial character with press mechanics or the place of the workmanship with manual form. The preparation of coconut staple fibers was made of natural form without use of chemical products not to deprive of characteristics the properties mechanical physicist-chemistries and of the same ones. The sixty bricks produced in simple and manual press had been carried through in four lots of fifteen units. The mixture of aggregates was made in four different traces composites for: ground erinaceous, cement, fiber of dry coconut and water; the bricks had been compact in the press and cured in natural way under an area covered during the minimum time of seven days

Um olhar sobre as veredas rosianas.

The present work objective to study the configurations that the hinterland it acquires in the workmanship Great hinterland: trails, of Guimarães Rosa demonstrating as this author humanize this element, conferring to it characters universal mystics and through investigations, uncertainties, the auto-corrections of Riobaldo that become hinterland a metaphor of the human interior. Three are the chapters, that they will guide this work: the chapter 1 presents as element key for characterization of the epic one in Great hinterland: trails, the mining hinterland replete of trails, palco of exuberant vegetation, huge and multidimensional scene, where it has an entrecruzamento of fiction and reality. It retakes quarrel of critics as Manuel Cavalcanti Proença, Roberto Schwarz, on the existing epic character in the Great hinterland: trails, constructed from deriving myths of the universal culture, that they had been become popular. The brave and gracious knight, that it has its representabilidade in the popular culture. Thus the medieval hero, the knight represented for the Riobaldo personage, it is cognominado by Proença as Don Riobaldo of the Urucuia, knight of the general fields. O chapter 2 is a study on the popular culture in Rosa and Cascudo. Cascudo the example of Rosa also is exímio studious of the brazilian life, the regionalization and the popular manifestations proceeding from other cultures. O chapter 3 it has as focus of analysis two mitopoéticas personages: Diadorim e Luzia-Homem, which in the cited narratives they generally they assume functions generally atribute the men. Since children, if they dresses male. Valley to point out that Diadorim is not characterized as man, since in Great hinterland:trails if trajaq always as gunman. Luzia, when complete 18 anos pass if to dress as woman, but the stigma of male and female, inherited of the time where it coexisted the father folloies it for all the life. They suffer pain to have been born to fight and to não conhecer to love. They die you deliver the God. This study detects exactly that Diadorim and Luzia-Homem, are personages associates the myths of the universal culture and popular (sphinx, Jellyfish, Venus, Mother d water), that they possess similarities n the archetypes, that transit between the sexos masculine and feminine, without any sexual connotation, possesss it proper code of honr, of this not abdicating ahead of the death. Parallel, in this chapter two cascudianas workmanships willbe studies, that contemplate thematic of the dressed woman of man and being the woman without disguice: the enchantment tale Maria Gomes and romance Flower of tragics romances. The first one will be revisited in order to present subject in Great hinterland:trails through the Diadorim personage. As it will discourse on cases of brave women, cited for Cascudo, immortalized for the tradition, who had made history, that already is not disfarçam of men to carry through acts of bravery and honor.

Os Brutos: tradição literária e a memória cultural do Seridó

Partindo do princípio de que a força centralizadora do discurso do narrador sob o universo romanesco encontra-se regido por nuanças sócio-ideológicas que fazem parte do mundo psicológico do autor, procede-se uma leitura crítica de Os Brutos (1938), romance de estréia do escritor José Bezerra Gomes. O trabalho mencionado visa a tecer algumas considerações em torno do ponto de vista do narrador, enfocando a encenação do EU no cenário artístico-literário e sua interferência no modo de narração da citada obra. O procedimento metodológico adotado foi a pesquisa bibliográfica, e como aporte teórico recorreu-se à crítica especializada que trata da temática em questão. Ao final percebeu-se que o discurso do narrador possui um caráter ambivalente, o qual permite que o interlocutor presente não assuma uma perspectiva fixa diante do que narra

O complexo geográfico em os sertões de Euclides da Cunha

The relation between geography and literature if has shown sufficiently promising.When considering that as much geography how much literature, constructs representations of the space from its speeches we find initially the point of interaction between both.In this direction, the workmanship "Os Sertões‖ of Euclides of the Wedge in allows them to argue where measured the existing specifications in a literary composition they can directly interest geography in the construction of its representations about the space.However to construct this approach, we take as north the conceptions of the complexity in which we weave the idea of that the workmanship if constitutes a geographic complex.We detach thus, the language of "Os Sertões‖ as one of the aspects that specify the complex in the Euclidean narrative and that it can interest geography in the production of its knowledge.As well as the language, the imagination is understood while an element that in makes possible them to analyze, to understand and to find the direction of the images made use in the space hinterland

O cristo no terceiro milênio: a visão plástica da arte sacra atual de Cláudio Pastro

Pós-graduação em Artes - IA

TV, Lobato e o ato da leitura: a mediação dos sentidos através da narrativa ficcional da TV brasileira

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Território e indústria: as empresas metalomecânicas em Sertãozinho

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Impactos da construção da UHE Três Irmãos sobre a atividade de mineração: importância de uma gestão ambiental

Pós-graduação em Geografia - FCT