A Man for All Roads

"I had no experience when I began, so it was total capacity building for me. All of the experience and knowledge I have came fro
"I had no experience when I began, so it was total capacity building for me. All of the experience and knowledge I have came from working on USAID projects. People respect me for my work. I would not be myself without this job."
USAID/AIRP
Iqbal Ahadi has been an engineer on four USAID-funded highways in Afghanistan
24 JULY 2011 | KABUL, AFGHANISTAN
 
When Iqbal Ahadi graduated from Kabul University with a de-gree in civil engineering, he wanted to build roads, but he had minimal experience. Nine years later, after working with USAID infrastructure projects throughout the country, there is hardly a road engineering job that Iqbal has not held.
 
For his first USAID job, Iqbal was hired to be a novice field en-gineer on the Kabul-to-Kandahar Road. Every day, he in-spected earth works, crawled into culverts, and measured drainage ditches along the roadway.
 
When the next phase of USAID road construction moved from Kandahar to Hirat, Iqbal became an office engineer. He pre-pared reports and progress charts, and facilitated technical support to all staff and site engineers.
 
A follow-on USAID project to design the Ghazni-to-Gardez road made Iqbal a deputy resident engineer.
 
By 2007, with three USAID roads under his belt, Iqbal became a senior roads engineer for multiple road projects, developing cost estimates, reviewing contracts, and making technical rec-ommendations to senior management.
In 2010, Iqbal assumed the prestigious position of deputy task order manager on the USAID project to survey and design the 150 kilometer Bamyan-to-Dushi Road. When built, the road will provide a northern by-pass to the Salang Tunnel, making travel and trade faster and safer for millions of Afghans.
 
All of Iqbal’s work with USAID projects has ensured the highest quality of road construction for Afghanistan’s major highways. Iqbal plans, designs, implements, and evaluates a complete road-building effort. Not only has he acquired great skills, he has helped transform the Afghan landscape.