Mark Bush shows there is a lot more to engineering than bridges and mineral process plants.
TAKING a close look at how crowns and teeth fracture is just the latest bit of engineering research for veteran Perth educator Mark Bush.
The long-time University of Western Australia engineering academic and new state head of Engineers Australia perhaps best personifies the diverse nature of the sector he has spent a large part of his life on promoting and developing.
Professor Bush has combined his lifelong love of animals and wildlife and an interest in biology with his expertise in mechanical, materials and biomedical engineering.
His early focus on fluid mechanics and how materials break up and change led him to look at how this could be applied to looking at the body, and to medicine.
“So I have been able to merge the two interests – engineering and biology,” Professor Bush says.
His teeth research, with the university’s dental school, is finding anthropological applications in the US, where scientists are using the findings to re-examine old teeth and find out more about ancient diets and lifestyles.
But it is promoting the skills and technical expertise of WA engineers and offering that to the world that he is very passionate about.
Professor Bush is keen to help nurture, develop and sell the many local ideas and expertise he says are the key to keeping jobs in the state and ensuring cash from the big resources projects is spent here.
He is wary of the current debate about the loss of fabrication and other manufacturing jobs going to offshore companies as the resources boom gathers pace in WA.
The simmering battle intensified late last week when UnionsWA and the Association of Professional Engineers, Scientists and Managers Australia vowed to keep the pressure on Premier Colin Barnett to keep skilled jobs local.
Professor Bush warns that calls for what he terms mandated local content come very close to advocating a form of protectionism, which he says is a very difficult question for government.
“The politicians are going to tread very carefully on this issue. I don’t necessarily think it is a productive way of approaching the problem,” he says.
“It touches on protectionism and is really a difficult landscape to navigate.”
The bottom line, he says, is that companies will make a business decision about where it makes economic sense for the work to be done. It is not something the engineers’ body can fight head on.
“Developing skills and technology is the obvious key in my mind to helping solve the local content issue,” Professor Bush says.
“We have to focus on devices and techniques that are unique to WA and so that there is no option for local organisations not to use local content.
“I have been really impressed by the amount of technical excellence that goes on in WA and this is reflected in our awards every year.”
Engineers Australia is already closely involved with both big and small players in the resources sector to further enhance the training of engineers in WA and to address the big, and growing, shortfall.
The organisation brought together industry and government leaders in June last year to try to get a handle on the role engineers could play in the WA’s development. They agreed education and enhancing technical capabilities were essential, coupled with an integrated approach to planning among the many stakeholders.
Professor Bush says this is still a work in progress and more talks with business and government will continue this year under Engineers Australia’s Centre for Engineering Leadership and Management.
He warns that WA is only producing about half the engineers it needs to cope with the growing skills shortages. The state’s big universities were turning out between 600 and 700 graduates a year.
The push is on to bring in more internationally trained engineers to the state and to attract more women to the profession. Women only make up about 15 per cent of engineering graduates nationally, mostly in chemical and environmental engineering, but this figure falls to about 8 per cent as they leave the industry.
Another big source of engineers is those trained overseas. Generally, their qualifications are high and meet Australian standards, but some of them struggle to find jobs.
Professor Bush says this could relate to cultural and communication difficulties and they often bump up against “inflexible” approaches from some Australian employers.
As a long-time animal and wildlife supporter, he is well-suited in his current role as director of the university’s animal research unit.
Professor Bush, 53, has a daughter who followed him into engineering and works in Perth.
He runs aviaries at his two-hectare property in Parkerville in Perth’s Hills and relaxes as an avid amateur cinematographer on numerous travels to Yellowstone Park and the north-west of the US.
“At least you can see and film many of their animals in the day time, ours are mostly nocturnal,” he says.
Professor Bush is keen to promote the social and community roles that engineers play, which is reflected in its theme for this year, humanitarian engineering, focused on improving quality of life and disaster recovery both here and overseas.
