Corporate governance of road construction in Brunei Darussalam

Abstract

Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) is not mandatory before starting any major road construction or infrastructure development in Brunei Darussalam. Nevertheless, some variations of impact assessment have been conducted as part of the feasibility studies for many of these projects. Such an obligation would encourage most consultants to focus on the merits and problems of the physical state of the environment. Their clients would then be led to examine and adopt the various engineering solutions along with the financial implications as laid out by the consultants. Assessment and preparation for socio-economic changes are often sidelined. Planning for modern transportation cannot afford to ignore the whole spectrum of the environmental impact. The selection of a road or its network is more often influenced by the human landscape and the change in environmental quality than by factors related to landform, earthwork and slope stability. During the construction and operation stages, the impact generally consists of a mixture of positive and negative components. The latter can then be made worse by poor quality in design, construction and maintenance. This paper draws a conceptual approach to the development of good corporate governance for key organisations (clients, consultants, contractors and suppliers) amidst the existing economic landscape and construction practices. All relevant organisations should ideally embrace the concept of an integrated Health, Safety, Environmental and Quality (HSEQ) system to deliver good governance. This structural change will enable all ‘key players’ to deliver solutions that match the benefits derived from traditional forms of EIA and quality assurance (QA). The paper attempts to embed the two obligatory functions, namely the QA and the EIA, into the self-regulatory, responsible, and competitive culture found among clients, consultants, contractors and suppliers in the road industry in Brunei Darussalam.