62021. 10.1

Japan Society of Civil Engineers
International Activities Center

IAC News No.108
Japanese Civil Engineers the Global Leaders Symposium Series No.18“The Challenges of Construction, Training, and Management for
the New Ulaanbaatar International Airport Project to Build an
Airport in the Capital of Mongolia”
On May 31, 2021, the Japanese Civil Engineers the Global Leaders
Symposium Series No.18 “The Challenges of Construction, Training,and Management for the New Ulaanbaatar International Airport
Project to Build an Airport in the Capital of Mongolia” was held by
the International Activities Center of JSCE. This symposium had
been in the works since last year, but it was held in May this year due
to the postponement of the opening of the airport due to the COVID19 pandemic. Following opening remarks from Mr. Okuda(Technical Deputy Director, Civil Aviation Bureau, Ministry of Land,
Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism), and Mr. Ieda (President,JSCE), Mr. Mori, (Director, Civil Aviation Bureau, Ministry of Land,Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism), Mr. Kondo (DeputyResearcher, JICA Social Infrastructure Department), Deputy Mayor
Kihara of Oita City (a former expert at JICA for many years), and Mr.
Ashida (Manager, International Affairs Office, Narita International Airport Corporation) explained about theefforts of the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism and JICA in the overseas airport sector,
the status of support for Mongolia, the progress of projects in Mongolia, and the transfer of skills. In particular,
the speakers introduced case studies fitting of the current state of affairs, such as the impact caused by postponing
the opening of the airport for one year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, Mr. Kihara, who stayed in
Mongolia for about three and a half years, introduced life in Mongolia and the culture there. It was a contentpacked three hours that contained not only information on the airport project but also slides that brought to life
the sheer magnificence of Mongolian nature.
The symposium was held entirely online, and the number of participants far exceeded those of previous
symposiums, with more than 400 applications received in advance of the event. It seems that the interest in
Mongolia, a country most of us are unfamiliar with, and the appeal of a top-class Japan-Mongolia project, whichbrought together construction and management, sparked many people's interest. I also think that a wide rangeof people were able to participate due to the symposium focusing on an airport project, which had not been
covered in this series so far. I sincerely hope that this airport will flourish as a new gateway to Mongolia. I would
also like to thank everyone involved in holding this symposium.

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Next time, as a slight change, I am holding a symposium focusing on case studies of ports and roads under thetheme of managing an overseas transportation infrastructure project. For further information, please visit thewebsite: https://committees.jsce.or.jp/kokusai/node/234.
【Reported by Masaru Suzuki (Leader, Project Group, IAC, JSCE)】“Enjoy Civil Engineering at Home This Summer”
At the JSCE Communication and Public Relation Center (Attractiveness of Civil
Engineering Group), over the two days of Saturday, July 17 and Saturday, August 21,
2021, we planned and implemented an online event entitled “Enjoy Civil Engineering at
Home This Summer - Aim to Become a Civil Engineering Professor of the Future!”
From 2017 to 2019, every July, at the JSCE Communications and Public Relations
Center, we held the “JSCE Open Campus” at the JSCE Headquarters (Yotsuya,Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo). To date, we invited a large number of people, including those
involved in JSCE, their families, and those who wish to go on to study civil engineeringor find work as a civil engineer, to the JSCE Headquarters. Here we provided an

Sachi Kawakami (JSCECommunications andPublic Relations Center)

opportunity to develop the participants' understanding of “civil engineering” throughvarious activity-based programs and video screening events. However,
due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has continued onfrom last year, it is difficult to directly invite participants to visit JSCEin person as we have done so in the “JSCE Open Campus” event to date.
Consequently, this fiscal year, as a new hands-on online event that
replaces the conventional direct participation method, we decided tohold “Enjoy Civil Engineering at Home This Summer - Aim to Become
a Civil Engineering Professor of the Future!”
Participants were elementary school students (the event was suggested
for 3rd to 6th graders), and although we originally planned to take on
12 people, we received many applications, and ultimately 19 people
participated in the event. The duration for one session was set to around50 minutes to an hour, and each day consisted of two sessions, for a totalof four sessions. We sent the experiment kits and report sheets to be usedas part of the event to the participants beforehand, and on the day, we“Enjoy Civil Engineering at Home This
Summer”

delivered a fun, class-based event where the teachers (JSCE members) and the participants (elementary schoolstudents) communicated back and forth via Zoom.

2The titles of the sessions were as follows: Session (1) “Let’s Protect Our Families from Landslides”, Session (2)“What Is the Difference Between the Shaking of Different Buildings?”, Session (3) “What Shape Makes for aStrong Tunnel? Circular, Triangular, or Square?”, and Session (4) “Civil Engineering Card Game from A-Z”.
The first three sessions were experiments and the fourth session was a card game competition using the “CivilEngineering Card Game” produced by JSCE. Those who participated in all four sessions were awarded the“Young Doboku Professor” certificate by JSCE.
As this was the first attempt at an event like this, at the planning stage, I was worried whether the event would
go smoothly while communicating well with the participants. However, due to the instructor's thoroughrehearsals and the positive that the participants (elementary school students) could use the event as free study
during their summer vacation, the event triggered a lot of excitement over the two-day period and receive highpraise in the questionnaire taken by the participants a few days later. I hope to make use of this experience forsimilar online events in the future.

“Young Doboku Professor” Certificate

Report Sheet Used During the Event

Participants Enjoy the Event【Reported by Sachi Kawakami (Leader, Civil Engineering PR Group, Citizen Exchange Group,JSCE Communications and Public Relations Center】

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Concrete Committee Webinars- Frontiers of Concrete Technology (FCT)The Concrete Committee of the Japan Society of Civil Engineers (JSCE)
has started the international webinar series “Frontiers of Concrete
Technology(FCT)” from 2021. It is intended to hold the webinar 2 or 3
times a year, and this year it was held for the first time in April and thesecond time in August.
The seminar aims to convey Japan’s cutting-edge research in concrete
technology to the world. However, if the lectures are only from Japanese
researchers, the number of attendees from overseas will not increase.
Therefore, themes are set for the seminars, and one Japanese researcher andone overseas researcher working on the selected theme are invited todeliver the lectures. The seminars provide time for a panel discussion, in
which the overall history, the present status, and the future direction of thatfield of research are discussed. In this way, the numbers of overseas
researchers and engineers participating will increase. Also, the seminars
are made more attractive by clarifying the themes and providing discussion
time. In addition, the seminars provide the Japanese participants with anopportunity to learn the status of world research.
The first seminar was held on April 16 on the theme “Use of FRP
Composites for Sustainable Concrete Structures.” The invited speakers
were Professor Tamon Ueda of Shenzhen University (China), andProfessor Jian-Guo Dai of The Hong Kong Polytechnic University. The
number of participants in the seminar was about 270. As it was a webinar,
there were participants from throughout the world, mainly from Asia.
The second seminar was held on August 4, on the theme “AgingManagement of Concrete Structures in Nuclear Power Plants.” The invited

1st & 2nd Seminar Flyers

speakers were Professor Ippei Maruyama of Nagoya University and Dr. Miguel Ferreira of the VTT TechnicalResearch Centre of Finland, Finland. Also, Professor Kenichiro Nakarai of Hiroshima University was invited asmoderator to raise the quality of the panel discussion. About 140 people participated in the seminar. Problemsof regulations and systems are encountered in the management of nuclear power facilities.
In the second seminar also the speakers introduced the latest research and its practical application, and the panel
discussion covered the status of the research field as a whole and its future direction. The discussion provided
an opportunity for the participants to learn not just about the latest research, but also the background to theresearch themes and the speakers’ ideas.
The seminars can be viewed on the JSCE YouTube channel.

4First Seminer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IP65Dudd6tk



Second Seminer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ArU-x-oyGig【Reported by Kohei Nagai, Concrete Committee, JSCE (The University of Tokyo)】Updates◆The 3rd JSCE-CCES Joint Symposium Online (October 20, 21)
https://committees.jsce.or.jp/kokusai/node/236◆Japanese Civil Engineers the Global Leaders Symposium Series No.19 (November 9)https://committees.jsce.or.jp/kokusai/node/234◆Japan's Infrastructure Grades 2020 & Introduction of Maintenance Technologies
https://www.jsce-int.org/node/733◆American Society of Civil Engineers（ASCE）
・【Zoom webinar】FEMA P-2090/NIST SP-1254, Recommended Options for Improving the Built
Environment for Post-Earthquake Reoccupancy and Functional Recovery Time (October 6, 12-1pm PST)
https://samueli.ucla.edu/fema-webinar-2021/
・International Conference on Sustainable Infrastructure（December, 2021）
http://app.message.asce.org/e/es?s=1360&e=713080&elqTrackId=f2b02296aa9c4f699603ed9d506586f4&el
q=5dbc17091cf64c9faaaae1d65ba9cab2&elqaid=26738&elqat=1
・ASCE Lifeline Conference 2021 2022
Dates updated: Jan 31-Feb 4, 2022
https://samueli.ucla.edu/lifelines2021/
・Joint Japan-US Symposium on Assessment, Management, andGovernance for Infrastructure Resilience*Pre-recorded Presentation Available on the Website.
https://www.infraresil.jp/event/01/◆The International Infrastructure Archives– A Compilation of Japan’s Greatest Projects in Transfer of Civil
Engineering Technology in Service –http://www.jsce.or.jp/e/archive/◆HUCE Newsletter Summer 2021 Issue – August 2021
https://committees.jsce.or.jp/kokusai/node/237

The 3rd JSCE-CCES
Joint Symposium Online(October 20, 21)◆IAC “News Pick Up!!” on the JSCE Japanese website
https://committees.jsce.or.jp/kokusai/iac_dayori_2021◆Summary of featured articles in JSCE Magazine Vol. 106, No.10 October 2021
http://www.jsce-int.org/pub/magazine◆Journal of JSCE
https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/browse/journalofjsce§ IAC News Subscription §The IAC News is one of the communication tools to share information and ideas with the members. We would like to invite
you, your friends and colleagues to join the communication and to subscribe the IAC News. Please register online:(http://www.jsce-int.org/node/150). We look forward to meeting you.
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Comments and Questions
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JSCE IAC: iac-news@jsce.or.jp

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