Transitional Government Prepares New National Building Safety Code

The transitional government is preparing a new “Syrian National Code” for safety standards in the construction of housing, industrial facilities, and tourist establishments. The new project aims to establish a more comprehensive framework for safety standards in construction, including requirements for earthquake-resistant design, fire safety, and resilience to natural disasters, as well as ensuring the structural safety of buildings.

The new code is expected to replace the current ‘Syrian Arab Code for the Design and Implementation of Reinforced Concrete Structures,’ a structural engineering code that sets the foundations for designing and constructing buildings to achieve minimum safety standards. The Syrian Engineers Syndicate adopted the first version of this code in 1992, before developing a second version in 1995 that included requirements for constructing earthquake-resistant buildings. Compliance with this code is a condition for obtaining a construction permit, as engineers are required to include it in the structural studies submitted with licensing applications, while the Syrian Engineers Syndicate and municipalities supervise adherence to its application during the licensing and implementation stages.

Last February, the General Secretariat of the Presidency formed a higher committee tasked with preparing the new Syrian National Code, as well as a draft law that will be presented to the People’s Assembly, with the aim of granting the code legal binding status and obliging builders to apply its standards in construction operations while imposing penalties on violators. This would move the code from being a technical reference enforced through licensing procedures and professional supervision to a binding legal framework that allows violations to be pursued judicially.

The new draft law will require approval from the Syrian Engineers Syndicate and the Ministry of Emergency and Disaster Management for future construction projects in order to monitor the application of safety standards under the code. The law will also impose penalties on those who fail to comply with the code’s standards.

The higher committee tasked with preparing the Syrian National Code held its first preparatory meeting on March 11, which was attended by one of our correspondents. The committee consists of 24 members and is chaired by the Minister of Emergency and Disaster Management. It includes representatives from the ministries of Emergency and Disaster Management, Public Works and Housing, Local Administration and Environment, and Economy and Industry, in addition to representatives from the Syrian Engineers Syndicate, the universities of Homs and Lattakia, and the Syrian Arab Organisation for Standardization and Metrology, which is affiliated with the Ministry of Economy and Industry and is responsible for preparing and approving national standard specifications for products and materials, including building materials. It is unclear why representatives of these two universities and not other ones were appointed.

During the meeting, the committee discussed the mechanism for preparing the new code, including reviewing Arab and international codes adopted in the field of construction in order to benefit from comparative experiences in establishing safety and construction standards. Work is also underway to form specialised technical committees in areas such as structural engineering systems and fire prevention. These committees will prepare the initial draft of the Syrian National Code, including the technical conditions and standards related to the safety of buildings and facilities.

The draft law will in turn undergo legal review to ensure its compatibility with existing laws and legislation before being presented to the public bodies concerned with construction and urban planning in order to provide comments and proposals. In the final stage, the code is expected to be issued and subsequently subject to periodic review in line with technological developments in the construction sector. The law will also require those wishing to build to apply the structural safety standards stipulated by the code.

During the meeting, the Minister of Emergency and Disaster Management Raed Al-Saleh said that there are shortcomings in updating the old code, considering that the country lacks a clear and comprehensive code related to safety, security, and protection from fires and natural disasters, the consequences of which became clearly evident after the February 2023 earthquake. Mr Saleh indicated that the need for a new national code is increasing with the expected urban expansion in the country, including residential tower projects and large urban developments, which requires modern structural standards that keep pace with global developments in the field of construction. He also stressed the importance of the role of the Syrian Engineers Syndicate in monitoring the application of the code’s standards on the ground.

Mr Saleh indicated that the problem is not limited only to updating the code, but also includes weak compliance with safety standards in a large number of residential buildings and industrial and tourist facilities. He cited the example of a warehouse in the Idlib countryside that was exposed to a fire in February which civil defence teams were unable to contain because there was no emergency exit, leading to major losses for its owner. He also referred to the collapse of a four-storey building in the Ashrafiyeh neighbourhood of the city of Aleppo on March 7 as a result of weak foundations and columns, which made it difficult for civil defence teams to remove the rubble and rescue the victims, resulting in ten deaths.