PESHAWAR, Jan 9: Earthquake retrofit strategy can help strengthen the existing buildings in the country through preliminary screening, performance evaluation and cost effective upgrading of the structures, a scholar said here on Wednesday.

Speaking on ‘seismic upgrade of structures’ at the NWFP University of Engineering and Technology, Dr Shamim A. Sheikh, a professor of Civil Engineering at University of Toronto, said that besides other engineering aspects badly structured columns were an important cause of the huge damage to buildings by the Oct 8, 2005 earthquake.

He said extensive research had been carried out in developed countries to fix the problems, ranging from developing a series of earthquake retrofit strategies to implementation plans for the strengthening of older buildings. Pakistan should benefit from the research, he stressed.

The professor said that keeping in view the risk of earthquakes and to be able to continue providing a safe work environment for people there was recognition of the need all over the world to evaluate and improve the seismic performance of older buildings to ensure that they met fully the requirements of current building codes.