Overview

The Afghanistan Engineering Support Program (AESP) provides architecture and engineering (A&E) services to support the USAID/Afghanistan Office of Economic Growth and Infrastructure (OEGI).  Activities under AESP complement the activities and expertise of USAID’s staff.  The AESP team provides resident A&E services and capacity building for local national employees, Afghan ministries, and USAID staff in several sectors: energy, transportation, water and sanitation, vertical structures, field/technical services, and communication.

Activities

• Energy Engineering:  Provide planning, design, and quality assurance services in electric power transmission and generation projects throughout Afghanistan.
• Transportation Engineering: Provide third-party quality assurance oversight services for: road projects and airport construction; master planning; and, engineering support for provincial reconstruction teams.  
• Vertical Structures:  Provide support for architectural, structural, mechanical, electrical, and plumbing design reviews.  Provide technical support and design services for education, health, and judicial facilities.
• Technical Services:  Provide technical reviews of existing dam and hydro-electric power facilities.  Assess potential dams for flood control, irrigation, and power generation.
• Capacity Building: Provide training and professional advancement opportunities for Afghan staff.  Training topics include: project management skills, computer-aided-design (CAD) techniques, application of building standards and technical specifications, communication skills, technical writing, and leadership.
• Empowerment of Female Engineering Students: Provide third and fourth-year female engineering students with on-the-job experience.   
• Media Assistance: Assist with community outreach and communication.

Accomplishments

• Woman Engineering Internship Program: Successfully provided real life engineering work experience to four female engineering students.  
• Capacity Building: Built management and leadership skills of local staff, resulting in the promotion of a local national engineer to Deputy Chief of Party in 2012.
• Transportation engineering: Completed eight road projects and three airport reconstruction quality assurance projects.
• Energy engineering: Completed 28 transmission and generation planning and design projects and assisted the vertical structures sector in electrical design reviews.
• Vertical structures A&E: Completed 22 vertical structure master planning, design, design review, and quality assurance projects.
• Sustainability/Operations and Maintenance: Created operations and maintenance (O&M) cost estimates for 21 USAID-funded construction or major rehabilitation facilities, which will allow the Afghan Government to more effectively create annual budgets for O&M.
• Water resources: Completed site visits to four hydro-electric dam sites, prepared and reviewed cost estimates for two dams, and reviewed the river hydraulics related to a bridge failure.
• Water and sanitation: Completed design of on-site wastewater treatment plants and water systems for two high schools and performed reviews of the Kabul Water Study and Kabul Water System bid documents.