Capacity Building and Sustainability: Research Findings and Recommendations

There are several underlying factors that are sometimes ignored while diagnosing companies with low capacity utilisation such as sustainability strategies for continuity and holistic approaches to engineering change management in this era of dynamism in technology. This chapter focusses on establishing the failures that contributed to low capacity utilisation through the various industry partners where engineering academics were seconded. Apart from the apparent observation of the use of conventional equipment, traditional and analytical methods of manufacturing and processing, most of the companies lacked the capital and expertise necessary to boost capacity utilisation, resulting in depressed throughputs and productivity. The data derived from the surveys, observations and interactive interviews complemented the information gathered and documented in Chap. 6, with the aim of demonstrating the sustainable building of capacity for both academia and industry to respond to engineering change management and bridging the gap between industry and academia.