A TRUE ENGINEER
- Thank you for making the time for us. How have you achieved such expertise? Can you talk about your background?
‘My name is Nasib Nasibov Mammad oghlu. I graduated from M. Azizbayov Petroleum and Chemistry Institute in 1976, majoring in machinery and equipment of oil and gas mines.
The Institute assigned me to the Bunyad Sardarov Machine-Building Plant the same year, where I started working as a process engineer. I was gradually promoted to designer engineer, technologist at the assembly shop, assistant mechanical supervisor, and head of the technical department. In 1976 the plant referred me to Moscow where I took a course on the development and application of special designs, press moulds and stamps.
On 31 May 1985 I was assigned to the Boiler Control and Lifting Equipment Inspection Service at the State Committee for Safe Conduct in Industry and Mine Safety (Dövdağtexnəzarət), where I worked as a field inspector and chief inspector. In 1997 I was appointed the head of the Gas Control Inspection at the Committee.
The President of the Republic of Azerbaijan issued a decree dated 16 December 2005, dissolving the State Committee, and establishing the Ministry of Emergency Situations. I was equally dismissed from my job at the committee and assigned to the position of the head of inspection for Safety Control at Liquid and Natural Gas Facilities at the Ministry of Emergency Situations State Agency for Safe Working in Industry and Mountain-Mining Control on 29 June 2006. I held the position until early November 2021 as I was required to retire as a civil servant. I took on the position of a senior specialist at Azerbaijan State Scientific Research Institute for Safety of Labour and Safety Precautions on 21 November 2021.
I have been honoured to receive numerous awards, such as the Decree of Honour on 15 December 2007 upon the order of the Minister of Emergency Situations, Honorary Engineer on 15 December 2009 upon the Decree of the President of the Republic of Azerbaijan and Jubilee Medal on 15 December 2010 by the order of the Minister of Emergency Situations.
I completed a seminar course ‘Against Proliferation of Chemical and Biological Weapons’ in the Republic of Hungary on 23 December 1999 upon a referral from the Cabinet of Ministers of the Republic of Azerbaijan. I also completed technical safety seminar courses on SEVESO directives in Belarus on 6 December 2013 and in Romania on 3 May 2014.
My wife is a docent and a candidate of chemical sciences. I have two children – a boy and a girl. My son is a judicial advisor, my daughter a psychologist.’
‘What have your learned and what have you been in charge of during your years in production?’
- My nine years at factories, where I worked as a technologist, designer, mechanic, chief mechanic, deputy chief engineer and head of the technical department, have helped me grow as a true engineer. On my part, I have done my best to fulfil all tasks assigned to me.
In my years as a designer, I spared no engineering skills in developing drawings for most complex constructions, including conductors, stamps and press forms, and producing them based on those drawings. The stamps, press forms and layouts I worked on were to assemble parts of intricate structures, rubber seals and complex constructions.
As the leading technologist at the assembly workshop, I was responsible for the technical supervision of the initial assembly version of the new model ‘Pipe laying crane’ and participated in its testing.
My role as a mechanic and chief mechanic included planned and supplemental maintenance and repairs of the main and technological equipment of the plant, thus keeping the production work in accordance with technical regulations.
When I worked as the deputy chief engineer, I oversaw the chief mechanics and energetics departments.
As the head of the technical department, I was the one in charge of technical supervision of the production of the equipment manufactured at the plant in accordance with technical lines and processes.
From 1985 to 1997 – while I was the inspector at the State Committee for Safe Conduct in Industry and Mine Safety – I was responsible for state control over the installation and safe operation of boilers, hoisting devices and pressure vessels. I developed requirements for the heads of factories and enterprises in accordance with the demands of legislative acts and oversaw their implementation regarding orderly maintenance and safe operation of devices in areas under my supervision. I raised one of such serious issues at Baku Tire Plant, which was then solved at a government level. I had the operation of five large volume boilers at the plant halted for overhaul. These boilers – installed at the Baku Tire Plant in the 1930s and not overhauled for years – supplied hot water to industrial enterprises in Narimanov District. The supervision entity filed the request to the Central Committee and the Cabinet of Ministers, who in turn, ordered the suspension of the boilers for major repair works.
From 1990 to 1997, during my years as state inspector at Heydar Aliyev Baku Deep Water Jacket Factory, I mainly engaged in supervision and preventive works and participated in the assembly of the ‘Chirag-1’ complex, which was the crucial part of a large oil contract. As a state inspector, I ensured that operations were carried out in compliance with the requirements of international safety norms and legislative acts in force in the country. As a result, we had no serious accidents throughout the assembly and installation of ‘Chirag-1’.
As I was appointed the head of the Gas Control Inspection at the Committee in 1997, I guided the operations of the inspection on the supervision of safe execution of works at liquid and natural gas facilities in Baku.
I handled the analysis of control and preventive works and revision of normative legal acts. I was the leading inspector involved in the development, coordination, and approval of the Rules ‘On approval of protective zones and safety rules in gas supply’. As a result, the Cabinet of Ministers of the Republic of Azerbaijan approved the decision with a decree Number 103 dated 21 June 1999. The rules are still in force and applied in relevant areas.
As I took on my responsibilities as the head of Inspection for Safety Control at Liquid and Natural Gas Facilities as the Ministry of Emergency Situations State Agency for Safe Working in Industry and Mountain-Mining Control on 29 June 2006, I supervised the inspection that controlled the safe conduct at liquid and natural gas facilities in Baku. Along the daily preventive measures, I must highlight our functions in ensuring the compliance of buildings with new constructions and designs, and the devices and equipment installed in them with the requirements of normative acts in force and safety regulations. Among these, we can name gas linkage for the ‘Flame Towers’, compressed gas station at the Baku Bus motor park, boiler room at the new Heydar Aliyev football stadium, as well as construction and commissioning of the compressed and liquid gas stations by SOCAR and Azpetrol, built applying the newest technologies. All these projects were carried out as a result of control and preventive measures by the inspection.
In 2015 The Ministry of Emergencies sent us on an exchange of best practices to Minsk, Republic of Belarus, where we had meetings with the management of ‘Gospromnadzor’, their state control entity. The Republic of Azerbaijan was represented by the head of the State Agency for Safe Working in Industry and Mountain-Mining Control and heads of the technical department and the inspection for Safety Control at Liquid and Natural Gas Facilities. The Republic of Belarus created fruitful business conditions for the exchange, which allowed us to have numerous meetings with various inspections and study their working methods and preventive measures they carry out. We then attended a meeting with the participation of the Chairman of the Committee and members of the leadership team of the Republic of Belarus. We had a fruitful question and answer session, where we brainstormed ideas.
During my years as the head of the inspection, I also supervised the commission on ‘investigation of works on purification, transportation, and delivery of natural and liquid gas to consumers’ at institutions under the State Oil Company (SOCAR) which was led by the State Agency for Safe Working in Industry and Mountain-Mining Control upon the order of the Ministry of Emergency Situations. Along with representatives of relevant institutions, we carried out examinations and investigations and prepared reports. I read the report at the meeting between Minister Kamaladdin Heydarov and the management of the State Oil Company. The participants of the meeting later discussed the report and made relevant decisions.’
- What was your main responsibility as a senior specialist at the institute and which projects would you like to participate in?
‘The senior specialist at the institute mainly oversees the correspondence of the technical documents for safety to the current legislative acts and demands the implementation of these requirements in work processes.
I am the deputy chairman of the commission established to prepare drafts of technical normative documents as per the order of the institute dated 10.12.2021. we have developed a work plan, identified the normative documents to be drafted, appointed working groups, coordinated the plan with the Agency and delegated to relevant staff.
However, as the President of the Republic of Azerbaijan signed a Decree on 24 September 2022 on ‘Establishing the Coordinating Commission to align the activities of public bodies in ensuring the safe use of potentially hazardous facilities’, the management at the Agency and the Institute instructed to temporarily suspend the development of normative documents at the Institute. One of the reasons behind the suspension is the special clause in the decree (4.2.3) on processing normative documents at a state level. This means that the Institute’s role in revising the normative documents will be reconsidered after the decision of the commission, established by the Decree of the President of the Republic of Azerbaijan.
The Agency held seminars and meetings in the regions on ‘Labour Safety – a system that protects employee life and health during work processes’, where I participated on the behalf of the Institute and delivered reports and speeches on the projects we have concluded and those still to be done. I answered the questions of the entrepreneurs and explained topics of interest. I informed the seminar participants on Institute’s work in 8 main directions.
The Ministry of Emergencies of the Republic of Azerbaijan issued an order on 2 March 2020 on establishing the Ganja Branch of Azerbaijan State Scientific-Research Institute of Labour Protection and Safety Engineering under the State Agency for Safe Working in Industry and Mountain-Mining Control. I was assigned to build a team of experts to launch the branch at the initial stage, train them at different departments of the institute, then oversee their placement in Ganja. I executed the assignment and the branch in Ganja is now operational. The expansion of their functions will be reviewed as the staff schedule and Regulations of the branch have been approved.
One of my primary responsibilities at the institute is to look into and confirm the compliance of expert opinions on technical safety of project designs, devices, and equipment at potentially hazardous objects to the requirements of normative legal acts. For this very purpose, I have been the member of the working group as for the order of the Institute dated 13 May 2022. We, the members of the group, read and study the expert opinions by our specialists and modify them should there be any comments or suggestions. We approve the expert opinions when they meet the requirements.
The Institute appointed experts to relevant industrial fields (more precisely, departments and laboratories) with an order dated 16 August 2022. We work with our experts on scientific and technical explanations and requirements regarding the daily expertise work. These events help them greatly to grow as skilled and experienced specialists.
At the same time, we have developed special attestation programs to train our experts at the Institute. These programs cover major industries. Currently, we are working on coordinating and selecting teachers at the programs, drawing up course schedules and other issues. One of our main tasks is certification, which greatly depends on the functions of the commission established by the Presidential decree I mentioned above and the involvement of well-informed specialists.
One of the main projects I would like to work on is to advance the skills and experience of our experts at the Institute and have them pass certification in their relevant specialties. The second project is to organize the revision of the normative-legal acts used in control areas at the Agency.
We have educated, experienced, and skilled specialists working at our Institute. I wish there to be more of them. What makes me happy is that a large portion of our staff is skilled and educated youth. It is our duty to multiply that number.
I must also emphasize that the management of both the Agency and the Institute have created favourable conditions to resolve these issues. We all clearly see that the main goal of the management is to build conditions for work, prioritize innovations, provide all-around assistance to employees, and appreciate their work. As a veteran engineer and specialist, who has worked in this system for 36 years, it is both my job and civic duty to take advantage of these conditions to resolve problems before me.’
- Nasib Bey, thank you for the interview. We wish you great achievements and good health on the eve of your birthday! We are proud to call ourselves your colleagues!
