We finally reached agreement on the approach for K-Infra’s online training to the Dutch Government. Rather than streaming the trainings in the regular 2-weeks period, it’s going to be an interesting and hopefully appealing mixture of webinars, training videos, quizzes ands case studies over a period of 6 weeks. Thus providing the participants with ample flexibility to study at their own pace and maintaining the required level of efforts for an adequate exam preparation. The challenge now is to prepare the necessary training materials, in particular the training videos. I need to record some 8 hours of videos and I have made the necessary preparations including - as advised by one of the other trainers Richard Foster from Foster Infrastructure in Australia - a green screen, web cam and mike in order to enhance the quality of the recordings. Took some effort to buy these items as they were sold out at the main online retailers. Assume more people are making the necessary provisions for effective online communications.
I have also supported my team in Bishkek, Bakyt Kartanbaev and Tolkun Shakeev, in reviewing the draft government instructions for a Request for Qualification and Request for Proposal for a PPP project as prepared by them. Good work. It’s nice to have colleagues on the ground that understand PPP and are able to tailer the necessary proceedings to the local context and regulations. We are also working on a model PPP agreement which is to be aligned with the Kyrgyz PPP Law and international best practices as reflected among others in the World Bank’s Guidance on Contractual Provisions for PPPs. Harmonising local legislation with international practices can be onerous and requires pragmatism in developing an appropriate deliverable.
Luckily the flow of business leads has not dried up. I was invited by the Dutch engineering firm Witteveen + Bos to participate in a proposal for the development of water transport systems for Lake Volta in Ghana. And with PPP Advisories in Nigeria I am working on a proposal for a possible PPP for licensing security guards. It illustrates that PPP does not only work for a toll road but can be applied to a range of public services.
In between I managed to help out a graduate student from my friend Professor Omar Smadi from Iowa University with a thesis on Value for Money. A topic high on my list of interests and hopefully this research will provide some further guidance on improving the applicability of this analytical tool.
Also the personal care was addressed this week. As my normal hairdresser Jolanda is not allowed to do my hair, I had to ask my wife to take care of it. Took some time, with Jolanda providing guidance through FaceTime, though I think the result is fairly descent. At least, the Grizzly Adams look is gone. And I tried to catch up with my physical exercise and did some runs this week. Very necessary as the amount of physical activities in the working from home environment was almost nihil. My average number of steps a day had reduced from around 8,000 to not more than a meager 3,000. Must admit that it was quite tough to do even a 3k run and I will definitely have to step up my game the coming weeks.
Stay strong
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