In conversation with Osama Ali – Chair Standards Australia Committee and CMEIG Engineering Working Group
Osama (Oz) is a chartered professional engineer and Caterpillar’s Technical Advisor for product safety and compliance matters in the Australia-Pacific region. His formative experiences have included product design and development, product compliance management, and testing and validation of earthmoving equipment. Oz presently chairs the Construction and Mining Equipment Industry Group (CMEIG) Engineering Working Group.
Standards Australia: Why and how did you get involved in standards development?
Oz: I’ve been lucky to be involved with standards in one way or another throughout most of my career. When I look back, my experience of working with and around standards, including referring to them as a design engineer, developing and conducting conformity tests, and then coordinating global compliance for an earthmoving product portfolio, has been quite formative in leading me to standards development.
In my current role, I now have an opportunity to ‘give back’ to the industry by being directly involved in a committee. Why I’m interested in standards development is not just due to the opportunity to make a difference, but also the people you meet and relationships you build. Standards development is volunteer work and I’m humbled by the dedication of the folks who help write these industry consensus documents.
SA: What is a project you’ve been particularly proud to have helped deliver?
Oz: A project that particularly stands out to me is the development of AS 5327:2019, Earth-moving Machinery Access Systems, which was a modified adoption of ISO 2867:2011.
Through an iterative process of consensus building, the working group was able to harmonise 6 often-disparate sources of guidance being used at the time in Australia into one consensus document – an exceptional example of industry collaboration. However, the journey isn’t over yet, we’re now using the work done during the development of AS 5327 to inform Australia’s position on the next revision of ISO 2867.
SA: How do standards and the work of your committee support the mining sector?
Oz: I’m very grateful to be part of a collaborative and energetic committee with broad representation from the mining sector. The committee is made up of regulators, mine operators, industry experts, equipment manufacturers, industry bodies and academia; it is fantastic to see these differing groups come together and develop documents that benefit the mining industry as a whole.
ME-063, Earthmoving Equipment, plays a critical role in defining (predominantly safety-related) standards for earthmoving equipment. Safe, efficient operation and maintenance of that equipment is critical to the competitiveness of Australia’s mining sector.
ME-063 has recently undertaken a broad-ranging portfolio refresh. We’ve removed about 60 aged standards and are now taking a three-pronged strategy of direct international adoptions, modified international adoptions where warranted, all while continuing to retain Australian benchmark standards.
There are around 100 standards in this pipeline which will give the Australian mining sector a set of contemporary performance-based earthmoving equipment standards. I’d highly encourage folks to keep an eye on Standards Australia’s public commenting system and contribute their expertise and ideas as these earthmoving machinery standards make their way to the public comment stage.
We also understand that many Australian mining sector stakeholders don’t have subscriptions to international standards, so adopting relevant international documents for Australian purposes provides greater access to global best practice for Australian users.
SA: What is the future of standardisation?
Oz: At a committee level, COVID-19 has been a bit of an experiment on the future of standards development. Within ME-063, we’ve had some wins in using digital collaboration tools, and I believe we’ll add some of these to our toolbox even once the world returns to a ‘new normal’.
More broadly speaking, in the mining sector, Australia is a big user of earthmoving equipment meaning we have lots of experience to bring to the international table. It’s our role within ME-063 to facilitate greater Australian participation in future international standardisation activities.
Technical standardisation as an economic and social philosophy continues to make sense. We’re living through an era of rapid technological progress, and more specifically, digitalisation and automation, I believe these trends will play into the future of standardisation.
In terms of the format and style of standards, I think the long-term challenge is adapting to an environment where traditional paper standards are complemented by explanatory material, perhaps akin to how we now search for information on YouTube or Google. We also have to keep in mind that the next generation of leaders will have grown up in a world that’s always been digital. I’m sure standardisation will continue to evolve in light of some these considerations.
Read full Standards Australia E-News June 2020 here.