Adaptability of a new national building code to the building sector in Sri Lanka

Abstract

Building Construction is one of the main economic activities where planning, designing, construction, funding and maintenance are included in completing a building project. Building controlling systems (BCs) have been identified as a necessary engine of global economic progress. Therefore, need arose to establish an important guideline for ensuring safe, innovative, energy and cost-effective building construction. Many countries utilize building codes to meet key requirements for health, safety, well-being, of people and the built environment. After facing many disasters Sri Lankans have understood the absence of a national building code. This study identifies six objectives after identifying the problem to examine the adaptability of a new National Building Code to the Building Sector in Sri Lanka. Lack of building code and awareness is noticeable as a gap in Sri Lanka and need for a National Building Code for building sector was significant. To address this gap as a problem, the researcher conducted qualitative research including semi-structured interviews to collect data and three main construction professions were identified, namely Chartered Architects, Chartered Engineers and Chartered Quantity Surveyors. Primary data collection method and a literature review as secondary data collection method. The respondents were identified by using the snowball sampling technique since the population is not précised and sample is limited to 12 participants in saturation. The data collected was analyzed by using manual content analysis. Research findings revealed the answers for the six research questions derived from the research objectives. The findings of the study reveals that, the Sri Lankan government will have to take major action in making awareness of the opportunities and challenges in future, to adopt a National Building Code to protect public health, safety, and well-being while lowering disaster risk and working towards a sustainable built environment. At the conclusion findings were presented as what is a building code ? Impact created by a building code, functions, opportunities created, challenges faced and recommendations to overcome those challenges were presented accomplishing the objectives. Keywords: Building Code, Construction Industry, Chartered Architects, Engineers, Quantity Surveyors, Impact, Public Health, Safety, Well-Being