Lazi Writa
The Nigerian property sector is said to worth over N20 trillion. In fact only two sub-sectors of the industry, the construction services and real estate provide the mainstay.
According to the National Bureau of Statistics, NBS, in 2022, while construction services earned N12.9 trillion, real estate contributed N7 trillion to the GDP.
However, the sector is plagued by incessant building collapses which not only waste millions of naira but also invaluable human lives
For instance the collapse of a seven-story building under construction at First Avenue, Banana Island, Lagos on Wednesday, April 12, 2023, appears the latest in the number of structures going down even before they are completed for habitation. That building was one of the four units being developed at the site. The case of the Banana Island building collapse shocked most professionals in the sector because that artificially-created Island is the home to the super rich and the Who-is-Who in the country.
Owning a property in Banana Island is no piece of cake. Only the super rich venture into the island to build. It is against this backdrop that questions of whether defective designs or compromise in the quality of materials could be responsible for the collapse of buildings obviously known to be for the people who can afford the best of materials and designs.
However, a tech expert with bias in quantity survey, Mr Tosin Abioye said lack of data collection and analysis at every level of building construction by both government and relevant engineers are major reasons buildings collapse. The American-based software developer said the issue of building construction is one that shouldn’t be left to rough calculation but pure empirical data collection and analysis.
He said in America every step of building construction is data-enabled and monitoring is a compulsory routine just as compromise in any detail is a crime no one would like to face the consequences.
As a contribution to efforts to stem the tide of building collapses in Nigeria, Abioye said he designed technological solution known as Rapisurv which could be used in data collection and monitoring of progress in the building construction environment.
The application is an end-to-end solution that simplifies and streamlines construction cost and contract management.
He said: “Rapisurv is a one-stop-shop, cloud-based, fully integrated end-to-end cost and contract administration solution for the construction industry. It simplifies the work of quantity surveyors, estimators, cost engineers and contract managers on both the client and contractor’s side, making them more productive without losing the industry standard methods of measurement and best practices.
“Rapisurv creates an ERP-like environment where a construction project can be handled from take-off through estimating, bidding, material requirements, contract award, variation management and valuation. Having both the consulting and contracting sides in the same system reduces tendering and bid turnaround time significantly. This solution helps through every stage of the construction contract administration and handles all processes and steps in the lifecycle of the project,” he added
He said the solution is distributed through his Isekit Limited, a registered tech company which operates in USA, Canada and Nigeria.
For him, “I am offering the building industry in Nigeria what will cut time and efforts to create bill of quantities by 70 per cent. What used to take 10 hours to complete can now be done in just three hours and most importantly the data is technologically primed that even government will have the ease of monitoring every building construction from start to finish without being fooled by anybody, because details are in the cloud”
On safety features on the app, Abioye said because it is based in the iCloud, work can be accessed from anywhere on planet. Also the two-factor authentication, makes it impossible for unauthorised persons to gain access, while the Rapisurv messages feature of the app, a collaboration tool to enhance project communications, keeps record of all communications relating to a project throughout its life cycle.
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