Yehia El Mahgary received BSc (with honors) in Engineering, Alexandria University, 1961. His postgraduate studies, leading to PhD and D.Tech.Sc. were on Environment and Energy, and took place at Helsinki University of Technology. His D.Tech.Sc. and immediate postdoctoral work concentrated on investigating the technical, economic, biological and legal aspects of pollution caused by power plants and industrial installations.
In 1976, he joined the Technical Research Center of Finland (VTT) where he worked until 1999 as Senior Advisor in Energy and Environment, responsible for developing, implementing/supervising and evaluating the industrial pollution and energy projects and activities of the Center. His team included three PhD, 20 MSc and five BSc/BA-investigators. In 1999 he left VTT to join the Finnish Environment Institute. Among the subjects he investigated were Cleaner Production/LNWT.
Since 1999 and up to 2003, Dr. El Mahgary has been working for The Finnish Environment Institute as Senior International Adviser in the Egyptian Pollution Abatement Project (EPAP), which is a joint project between the Egyptian Government, the Finnish Government, the World Bank and the European Investment Bank. The project’s main goal is to provide technical and financial assistance for industrial establishments in Egypt to comply with the Environmental Law.
Dr. El Mahgary worked earlier for two years as UNESCO Chair Professor on Environment and Energy at Alexandria University, Egypt, and the Manager of the Capacity-Building Project for the staff of the Faculty of Engineering (FOE) and the Institute of Graduate Studies and Research (IGSR). During this period he developed the curricula of the FOE and the IGSR to include new subjects as environment, energy management and conservation and cleaner production, and participated in teaching these subjects at the graduate level. He arranged several Seminars and Training Workshops for the staff of FOE and IGSR on Renewable Energy, Industrial Pollution and Environment Protection, Energy Management, Cleaner Production and Life Cycle Assessments (publ. 123–130).
He had also worked in a consulting capacity as CTA (Chief Technical Adviser) of the IDB/UNDP project in Guyana in Strengthening Environmental Assessment and Monitoring Capabilities of Guyana, and of UNDP Energy and Petroleum Management in Vanuatu.
He also worked as Project Director of UNIDO/UNEP’s project on Low- and Non-Waste Technology (LNWT) in East Europe, South America and the Middle East. He has also been the Energy Coordinator and the member for Encyclopedia of Life Support System (EOLSS), and a member of the Editorial Board of the Journal of Renewable Energy Sources and the Journal of Electricity in Finland.
Dr. El Mahgary acted as Chairman of the Pacific Section of the International Solar Energy Society, member of the UN high-level mission in the Pacific for preparation of UN Conference on New and Renewable Energy Sources and member of the Finnish delegations to a number of UN Conferences and Commissions’ meetings.
He is the author of more than 140 journal publications, conference papers, research reports and UN-series reports, and the co-editor/author of three books on thermal pollution, Integrated Rural Energy Planning and Energy Storage.
Dr. El Mahgary has frequently given invited lectures to conferences and institutions worldwide, including countries of the Far East as China, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand, of Asia as India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, and of the Middle East as Abu Dhabi, Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq and Kuwait.
He has worked as a consultant for several international and national organizations, including: UNEP, UNIDO, UNEPCC, ESCAP, UNESCO, WED (Abu Dhabi), SONATRACH (Algeria), and as special advisor to the Executive Director of UNEP and the Executive Secretary of ESCAP. He has also been a reviewer to a number of UN publications as The State of the Environment and the IPCC reports and publications, and an assessor for UN project proposals and activities in the domain of Energy and Environment.
In addition, he has worked several years as international civil servant, as Chief Technical Advisor of UN-DTCP/UNDP project on Energy and Petroleum in Vanuatu, Chief of Energy Section in UNEP in Nairobi, Kenya, Officer-in-Charge of Renewable Energy in UN-ESCAP in Bangkok, Thailand, and UNESCO expert in Energy in Alger, Algeria. In between these UN posts Dr. El Mahgary returned to his job in VTT. This helped him to stay in touch with the latest developments in his field, to act as a bridge between North and South for technology transfer in the fields of Industry Pollution Abatement, Cleaner Production, Environment Protection and Energy, and to initiate and arrange funds for several international and national projects (total budget US$20–30 million); both in the developing world and in Europe.
COOPERATION BETWEEN DEVELOPED AND DEVELOPING COUNTRIES FOR IMPROVING EDUCATION AND RESEARCH IN ENGINEERING SCIENCES
(Yehia El Mahgary, Dr.Tech., Senior International Advisor in Energy and Environment; Ali El-Nashar, PhD, Senior International Expert in Energy and Desalination)
The paper will address the steps that should be taken to ensure successful cooperation between developed and developing countries in order to improve education and research in the field of engineering sciences. Following the introduction, which will consider few examples of classic cooperation between developing and developed countries, the paper will generally consider the current situation of education and research in engineering sciences in developing countries, Egypt being the case study. In most developing countries, no comprehensive and/or integrated planning is being made to the post primary education, which should be compulsory. As a matter of fact there is evidence that many children escape, or are being pulled out, from primary education to the street or to children market of cheap labor power, mainly because of economic difficulties of their families. Hence, contrary to all odds, free-of-charge education did not help the most needy or poorest families, who often continue in the way of poverty because of lack of education of their children. Further, the number of students accepted in the preparatory, secondary and university education is not planned according to the needs of the country. Of particular importance here is the ratio of places in normal preparatory schools to those in technical schools, which graduate skill labors, the ratio of those attending the secondary schools to secondary technical schools, which graduate technicians and college engineers (B engineers), and finally the ratio of those attending theoretical faculties (as economics, administration, literature and law) to those attending practical or applied science faculties (as engineering, medicine, pharmacology and science). In principle, for each stage there should be plans, which depend on continuous and comprehensive study of the national and international markets. Accordingly, in order for the cooperation process between developing and developed countries in engineering education and research be successful, there are a number of procedures that developing countries have to undertake themselves before starting the cooperation. The key issue in this process is long-term integrated and comprehensive planning (LICP). All governmental organizations, private sector, NGOs and individuals should be aware of the LICP, its importance, its meaning, how to make use of it and how to have an input to it. Here, we shall define the main goals of the country, the needs to achieve these goals and hence human resources requirements, their fields and the level of their education, and the funds required for these processes. The second important task that has to be undertaken by the developing country is upgrading of the administration system in the sector where cooperation with developed country will take place. Finally. The problems that hinder the improvement and development of engineering education and research in developing countries and suggestions for their remedies will be considered.