Integration and impact of BIM in the rehabilitation of buildings in developing countries

Abstract

ABSTRACT Building Information Modelling (BIM) has been recommended as one of the paradigms to efficiently manage asset information especially for maintenance purposes. Although still emerging, BIM benefits in cost and time savings are already being reaped in developed countries, yet its applications in developing countries are scarce. This study investigates a BIM method used in the rehabilitation of buildings in Cameroon, an African country still in its infancy in BIM adoption and compares the approach to the conventional sequential approach of project delivery. The method was implemented on rehabilitation of buildings at the Douala seaport in Cameroon. The results obtained revealed savings of 22% and 31% on costs and time respectively. These findings serve as a hope to developing countries to embrace BIM in their projects. Given this study used buildings in the Douala seaport, it is recommended that future studies should examine BIM for other projects in Cameroon.