Assessment of Effectiveness of National Building Code (NBC) Implementation: A Case Study of Kirtipur Municipality of Kathmandu District, Bagmati Province In Nepal

Abstract

The risk of earthquake in Nepal is very high and is increasing significantly due to rapid urbanization associated with a lack of public awareness and poor construction practice. Around three-quarters of all deaths in earthquakes are due to building collapse, making effective implementation of the National Building Code (NBC) essential. This research examines the public awareness level and construction practice of building in the field for NBC implementation, along with the trend of this awareness and practice and whether NBC implementation is being institutionalized, in Kirtipur Municipality of Kathmandu District, Nepal. The study was conducted from Poush 2076 to Chaitra 2079 B.S. in Kirtipur Municipality, using field observation, in-depth interviews, focus group discussions, and a questionnaire survey administered to 173 building owners. Public awareness was found to be quite satisfactory: owners were informed about the Building Permit Process (90.17%), NBC implementation for safer construction (58.38%), building design before construction (70.52%), use of skilled masons (87.86%), and supervision of under-construction buildings (89.02%). The trend of awareness across all these indicators rose significantly after the 2015 Gorkha earthquake and has followed a broadly progressive trend since. Construction practice was also observed to be largely satisfactory, with the exception of supervision, though the overall trend of good construction practice was found to be declining except for the use of contractors. Owners designed their buildings through engineers (65.90%), received Building Permit Certificates (76.30%), constructed through skilled masons (55.49%) or contractors (25.43%), were supervised by technical persons (52.61%) or by owners themselves (42.77%), and received Building Completion Certificates (61.27%). By contrast, field observation found that only 28% of under-construction buildings had a Building Permit Certificate and only 20% were supervised by a technical person. Design and field status were also quite satisfactory except for full building code compliance: only 15.61% of buildings had applied the building code, structural integrity was the major significance factor motivating code implementation, small plot size was the major hindrance factor, only 11.56% of owners conducted a soil test before construction, only 9.25% of buildings complied with the code in terms of concrete grade, 58.96% had columns smaller than 300 mm, 30.06% exhibited a strong-column–weak-beam configuration, only 26.01% had under-reinforced slabs, and 13.29% fell under permissible irregularity. Institutionalization of NBC emerges as the essential bridge connecting awareness and practice; the study recommends establishing a separate building code implementation unit with dedicated resources and approved guidelines, institutionalizing capacity building for technical persons and masons, and mobilizing community-based organizations, since NBC implementation is not purely a technical issue but also a social one.