Why Many Projects Fail At Rural Areas Construction Essay

The construction industry is regarded as one of major indicators of the countrys economy, especially for developing countries. Periods of prosperity are usually associated with a large volume of construction activity, yet the rate of construction project failures is unacceptably high.

2. Abstract

Purpose – investigation into the cause of construction projects failure in rural areas, the research has been working at Kwazulu Natal (KZN) Province. The is research going to look at poor management, poor planning, lack of proper skill and cost overspend which is a merger problem to all construction Industry special to developed and developing countries. The purpose of this research is to find the factors enforce cost overspending to the construction industry which is affect south Africa economy.

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Literature reviews- Survey, curried out challenges through interviews of 2 Local Municipalities in rural areas, projects managers, project planners and also look at the budget were allocated for projects in rural and also conducted interview to the relevant stakeholders, through different news paper, through internet so that can be able to access the opinions of other people and get some literature books, the information will reveal proper equipments that is good for rural condition and it will come out with solution regards project failure.

Findings – research will be assist the government and other stakeholders to achieve good production in rural development, Analysis of theory via literature review would be aimed at finding answers to the question regarding the essential elements of project failure in rural developments and interview would be recorded with the permission of the interviewees. Internet would be the preferred method of obtaining precedents. We as consultant employed by government to identify the problem and find the solution so that we can give advice to government we undertake the research up to the ends. Ever since the research is on process to reach all the goals regards project failure in KZN special in rural areas.

Conclusion-The consultant that will undertake studies concerning the cause and factors that influence to project in rural areas, were reliable because has found from construction Industry. As a consultant I will do my best to keep client happy and respect all stakeholders and would resolve the issue, if government and other stakeholders improve the standard too and ensure that all the work that carry out by Municipalities at rural has to be done effectively and efficiently.

3. Introduction

Background of the study

Many challenges in construction industry throughout the country are presented by different

Personalities, financial limitations, time and scheduling, technical barriers, development work faces issues that are unique to the developing country. These problems may be present in country but due to inherent characteristics of developing, these issues are exacerbated and pose even larger challenges in development work. Throughout the developing people suffer due inadequate or failing of infrastructure. Infrastructure which are houses, roads, school and bridges, is the physical foundation on which development efforts and improved living standard are established. The construction industry in developing countries states that the construction industry is an essential contributor to the process of development, influencing nearly every sector of the economy. Improving the capacity and capabilities of the construction industry in developing countries is a critical step to improving infrastructure development that is over looked. (Kraig Lothe).

According Kraig Lothe; South Africa is developing country and there have big demand of infrastructure for the people of the country special those who stay in rural areas to improve lives and reduce homeless people. People are still suffering in rural areas due to the problem of project failure which cost government alot of money without a change that was a reason of such research

Attempts have been made to identify critical factors that lead to project failure in the relevant collected works; however the causes of project failure in South Africa are not well known or documented especially the degree to which project consultants contribute to this failure. The construction projects, however, fail at a shocking rate international more than 50% by some estimates. The South Africa construction industry, which is generally considered to be dysfunctional, is no exception with many stakeholders in the construction process concluding, although not necessarily to the same degree, that project failure is rampant. A research will go to identify the causes of project failure especially in rural area.

4. Statement of the problem

Infrastructure throughout the developing country consistently falls into disrepair. The project are not built to the same level of quality expected industry national and in many instances the local Municipalities in KZN do not have the capacity or desire to implements the project. This occurs because projects are initiated from the top, down, paying little attention to the needs and capacity of the local Municipalities. Difficulties that projects manages experience during the planning stage of a projects, need to look at insufficient propel skill in the construction industry that were used in rural projects. It is clear that this project lacked key elements in its design and implementation. A successful project is flexible and able to adapt to various contexts and still maintain Monitoring and evaluation of project progress through indicators is always necessary, especially in rural areas. In terms of implementation, project officers working on the ground, especially in extreme situations like current in KZN, should have some overseas experience and background information before arriving. Context where national institution cannot be relay on similarly, alternative methods of keeping track of finances needed to be developed in the context of a cash-only local economy.

5. The aim

This study aims to examine the service delivery in rural areas, and to come up with a solution of finding a better way of project delivery in rural areas at KZN.

6. Objective of the study

The objectives of study are to:

? Is to find the cause of project failure in rural areas

? Is to check the capacity of local Municipality to manage themselves their project.

? The need of proper skill in construction industry

? To emphases quality work in construction industry.

7. Research questions

The study will be guided by the following research questions:

? What causing construction projects to fail in rural?

? Why local Municipality fail to rectify soon a problem of poor project delivery in rural?

? How could improve construction industry in rural areas?

? Which purposes does the research would achieve regards construction project in rural?

8. Research design

As defined by the Construction Specifications institute (CSI), project delivery is the contractual relationships between the owner, designer, contractor(s), and the management services utilized to design and construct a project (CSI, 2005). Project delivery is the framework used to take a project from its initiation stage to completion. The most common delivery systems used today in the developed country are design-bid-build, design-build and construction management (Arditi et al., 2002).

In the developing country, engineers have only recently been introduced to different project delivery systems. Before this, the contractors acted as master builders coordinating everything from start to finish. This master builder system leaves no gaps between participants and uses a simple contractual agreement. Unfortunately, the system can no longer be implemented effectively as modern construction has become too complex.

There is a large separation of knowledge and responsibility between the design and construction phases. This causes major problems in both the design and construction. Designers do not have practical construction experience so local knowledge and construction techniques are not taken into account during the design, causing unreasonable expectations and inadequate specifications. The skill levels and knowledge of the contractors vary greatly. Designers also complain that they have to over compensate for the expected lack of skill in operations and maintenance (Davis and Brikke, 1995), but this is exactly what is needed to design for sustainability.

According Arditi information that is a reality, system have to follow to all project in order to minimize the problems and because project includes many parties need to be involve and satisfied with process, the project manager have to play a big role to make all parties happy and project could be smooth.

9. Literature Survey

Conducting an interviews with the different Municipalities and Transport in rural areas that are affected by the issue of project failure in construction industry. They are serious factors that are influencing construction project which are uncoordet building environment professionals, collection of data, poor user input, poor project design and leadership; design and construction problems; and inappropriate staff skills; unrealistic timescales and cost estimation; poor selection of building procurement methods; failure to plan and lack of pre-project planning, and researching information on people who were specialist in the construction industry namely: architect, quantity surveyor, project manager, and structural engineer that are play a leading role in the development team.

10. Methodology

Interview conducted through emails and telephonically with two municipalities which is Jozini and Umvoti.

Jozini is local Municipality in rural area which is in North Coast of Kwazulu Natal at 125km towards the bonder of Mozambique and 78km towards the bonder of Swaziland, that municipality is under UMkhanyakude district Municipality. Jozini municipality is on struggle to push service delivery at rural area.

Interview conducted with the Technical director regarding challenges that led to construction project to fail explain the following issue:

Housing project

Municipality has been experiencing a lot of challenges to housing project that was allocated to Kwajobe Area under Jobe Traditional Authority, as a rural insitu upgrade, project has been finish on 2008 June but there were many defects that need to be attend such as , floor cracks, wall cracks, roof took off by storm. The beneficiaries were unhappy at all about houses that were built; therefore municipality got a challenge to rectify those houses because consultants who were project manager have overspending the cost.

And he added that there is a current insitu upgrade housing project that allocated Emakhonyeni area is still in planning stage for 4yrs, consultant report many difficulties that might cause project fail. The Municipality which has influence over the Munyeni Traditional Council area has forwarded a request for the approval of 1000 rural subsidies, for this project. Due to the limited capacity of the Municipality, an Implementing Agent has been appointed to undertake the housing development. The submission for stage 1(beginning of the planning process) was approved by the MEC of Human Settlements on 02 March 2010, since then there is no progress and consultant declared to municipality that they fails to undertaking the project to other stage.

According Jozini municipality they employed Implementing Agents that were not qualified to do work in order such big project because in the rural areas need advance equipment to reach even a place that are not easily to reach. There is a big challenge facing rural areas even also government tried to developed relevant skilled people in order to fight against the insufficient of unskillful people in rural.

Road construction

Jozini Municipality plan to networking of the road comprises a hierarchical network of roads, being Primary, District and Local roads. The Jozini Municipality aims to develop a road network that will service all its communities and people to ensure that they need not walk more than 5 km to reach a Primary road or District road. This objective is already realized for some areas in the municipality area the runs.

The condition of gravel roads are deteriorating rapidly and maintenance there to appear to be

inadequate and roads often become impossible in wet conditions. The maintenance of these

roads are a dedicated responsibility of the Department of Transport.

An assessment of the location of the proposed development nodes have indicated an adequate all

weather access to each of these. The nodes are further located on bus routes, which enhances

the development potential thereof. The development nodes identified are located on district roads.

The challenges regarding roads construction era equipment that were not easily to found because its cost lot of money here and transport it, as the result company s were failed to keep it until project would be over. The Road is 17 km from Jozini village to Makhathini flats and supposed to take one and half year to constructed but seems as it will take 6 years, still there is lot of work to be done. Municipality has been changing contractors to do something. There is a road from uMbombo to Mbazwane that road connecting uMbombo hospital and Mseleni hospital minister of transport at KNZ had approved the project in 2009 August and the contractor has been employed since then there is no visible progress regarding the project. The maintenance of these roads is a dedicated responsibility of the Department of Transport.

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Proposed Transport Facilities

In order to enhance the public transport facilities, it is proposed that taxi/bus stops be introduced at current locations two types of facilities are foreseen, namely:

– Major taxi/bus facilities which will comprise formal paved areas with passenger waiting

facilities, the last mentioned which will be roofed. This will normally be served by existing

shops and post boxes. This facility can be enhanced by formalized institutional facilities in the

form of clinics, tribal courts and pension payout points.

– Minor taxi/bus facilities which will be only mark stall facilities and passenger waiting facilities.

Provincial Roads

As indicated above, the provincial roads have merely been provided as guidance as this has no

effects on the analysis. The majorities of the provincial roads, being specifically the P and D roads, are of reasonable standard and frequently maintained by the authorities. The L and A roads are generally of inferior quality and only portions thereof are maintained by the authorities, and not on a Regular basis.

Municipal Roads

The municipal roads have been identified as those roads which serve at least 10 households as

Secondary roads and 20 households as primary roads, whilst the household access roads

predominantly will serves individuals household. Arising from aforementioned, the cost to establish the household access roads appears to be fairly prohibitive and should be prioritized only after the municipal rural roads have been established and after a maintenance budget have been affected therefore.

The condition of the rural roads was assessed during in loco inspections. The condition could be

classified according to the following norms:

Surfaced roads, being those that have been formally constructed and provided with an all

weather surface.

Gravel roads, being those that had formally been shaped and provided with a gravel surface.

Dirt roads, being those that were merely formed through blading.

Tracks, being those formed through use of only vehicles.

The majority of the municipal roads in existence were classified as dirty roads, being those which had merely been bladed, with no formal gravel surface or storm water drainage. These however still provide access to homesteads.

Operations and Maintenance

The provision and maintenance of roads is a dedicated responsibility of the Department of

Transport. The said Department has established Road Transportation Forums, which prioritize the provision thereof in terms of the needs expressed by the community. This includes the provision of river crossings and bridges.

Umvoti Municipality is a Category B municipality and is one of the four local municipalities within Umzinyathi District.Greytown,the main centre is situated approximately 65km from Pietermaritzburg and 100km from Stanger, and includes the town of Kranskop (refer to Map 1). It is about 2509km in extent and its population is estimated between 92 419 people and 117 000 people who are spread unevenly among the eleven municipal wards.

It is located on the southern part of UMzinyathi District, and borders onto uMgungundlovu District to the south, Mshwathi Local Municipality, and largely falls within the Pietermaritzburg functional economic region. The parts of the municipality that borders onto King Shaka District enjoy the influence of Stanger-KwaDukuza economic region. Umvoti Local

Municipality is well integrated into the Provincial transportation network.

Route 33

MAP 1: LOCALITY MAP

Umvoti serves as a major link between Greytown and Dundee while R74 connects the urban centre of Greytown, Kranskop and is the largest of four Municipalities, in terms of area, in the UMzinyathi District.

Umvoti local municipality has been challenged both housing and road although that municipality has advantage of big road passing through which is R74, but they challenged to the access road and bridges that connect communities. According municipal official those access road have been identified and also bridges were approved because of the different challenges since then no bridges been constructed.

Housing project have a big problem because Umvoti municipality surrounded by privates property that is not easy to develop, like one project is called Muden housing project that was given CHS developments as Implementing Agent. Muden housing project has been takes more five years still in the planning stage1. The cause of the matter is property that owners not by ingonyama trust as policy state that rural project was awarded only people who live under ingonyama trust land or property. CHS Developments still waiting approval for a proposal to use a property as Implementing Agent .

Consultants

Interview conducted with some of project managers regarding project failure in rural areas which is a big problem that affects people who are living at rural. There number of issue mention which is a policy, shortage of equipments, skill challenge, material, political leadership.

1. Policy that government had been set as guide lines of how to implements a project, sometime makes things to be more difficult end up cause many problems, eg a stage1 application its take time to approve and it s process usually been very slow than expected.

2. The shortage of equipments mentioned as a major problem in construction actually is not a rural areas problem only even at urban areas is a common problem but that s worse in rural areas. The project has been stack if is difficult to find relevant equipment.

3. The construction industry has a big challenge in term of people who have skill because most of them got relevant qualification with very poorer performance in practical work, as the results project fail to met the construction standard will end up fails.

4. The most problem in rural areas is material that s not easy to find it due the smaller stock in hardwires shop, even if you please order will takes long time to receive it, that one cause lot of delays end up whole project fail.

5. Political leadership sometimes cause lot of confusion in the project when they made unnecessary decision without observing the policy that should follow to runs a project.

What causing construction projects to fail in rural?

The budget that allocated for the projects in rural might be not enough amounts to compared with work to be done.

The Consultants spend long time to prepare the projects and to implementation of it, material require according to the specifications is not easily to find at rural areas, equipment to be use are not found because due to the area condition need the advance machine so to be able to reach even the steep slope and unaccesseble sites. The main challenge projects were failing to reach the quality standard of construction industry. Many challenges in construction projects throughout the country are presented by different personalities, financial limitations, time and scheduling, technical barriers, and various surprises of difficulties. Development work faces issues that are unique to the developing country. These problems may be present in industrialized national but due to inherent characteristics of developing country, these issues are exacerbated and pose even larger challenges in development work. The municipality employed unqualified consultant as the results there is no progress.

Cost/ benefits

Travelling expenses in conducting the interviews to the different of Municipality and Department of Public Work & Transport at rural areas, I have been get newspaper articles and using internet cafes to get more information and even makes number of calls.

Impact

5. Advantages and Disadvantages

Rural area have still challenged with A problem with the apolitical approach is that it is not apolitical.

In addition to including an academic perspective to appreciate context, it is also important

to include political perspectives to avoid unintentionally or indirectly causing harm in a situation. Any astute observer may wonder, if development projects without

Multidisciplinary collaborations, as they are most often designed and implemented, have not produced positive results then are it possible that the good intentions have produced negative results?

There are countless ways in which external interventions can thwart the internal development of a community or a nation and in some cases, fuel violence and corruption and contribute to the degradation of existing structures and systems.

Why local Municipality fail to rectify a problem of poor delivery in rural?

Projects also fail because they do not meet user requirements and are full of assumptions that give rise to conflict. Architect sometime get their briefs from people who are not regular users of the building or do not know the specific requirements of the building. Informed end users must give meaningful input during every phase of the briefing, design and construction. Some of projects are finally cancelled simply because people did not like each other. Others fail because the design team did not know or did not bother to find out who the real stakeholders are or whether they were going to support it. Parties also tend to rigidly defend their positions.

7. Model processing

The rural project process in different system unlike unban project is severely fragmented and there appears to several barriers to development, particularly that of parties tending to rigidly defend their own turfs.

The property development requires a combination of specialist, traditionally organized into a district occupation groups. According to Hindle (1996), the differences among the specialist consultants involved in a project are emphasized with the results that major discontinuities are created by the focus on function rather than process. For project success these professionals should not act in isolation but a well defined and closely knit network.

8. Model Output

The outcome of the construction project in the context of its relevant solution system. The planners and designers of a construction project team, irrespective of the number of members, contribute the cognitive complexity mentioned, inadequate management knowledge and systems. One needs to identify the root causes of systems failures and to select and implement effective measures .Needs to adopt the basic principle of systems thinking can increase the prospects of project success.

Definition of terms

For the purpose of this study the following definitions apply

Projects in rural areas

Construction

Construction is a risk-driven, multi-dimensional process; it is a series of interdependent steps, each requiring specific technical knowledge and participants working together. In the developing country, construction employs techniques, materials and expertise that make perfect use of available resources and expertise, while others compromise the integrity of the final product. Material delays, misunderstandings, and discrepancies in design are a few common problems that prevent projects from being completed successfully, on time. Every party in the project must work together in a coordinated effort because tasks are interdependent.

If one person fails, so may the entire project.

The following are some of the most common problems encountered during the construction, sometime Municipality facing a difficulties to find a good project manager as the results project fails to manage propel. The rural projects include many parties such as community, traditional leadership work together with Municipality and other stockholders, usually the common project in rural such as housing, schools roads working.

Material Procurement

Material procurement in developing countries require significant pre-planning due to road conditions, scarcity of transportation, and inconsistency of suppliers. Many sites are remote and are accessed by small 4-wheel drive vehicles, horse, and in some cases only by foot. Roads are also often washed out and thus prevent any vehicles from passing. For example, gravel, sand and aggregate are taken from local river beds. Often rivers swell, access to the river beds becomes impossible, and aggregate cannot be obtained. Local materials should be ordered early to prevent delays

Project in Urban areas

In many countries administration was the capital city and all development was focused on the capital city with infrastructure such as transport (road, rail, and air) concentrated around the capitals. The urban areas are the centre for economic growth and offer employment opportunities not found in the rural areas. Worldwide there is a drift towards the urban areas creating strains on the infrastructures and administration of these areas. At some time the rural areas are usually poorly serviced and sup-ported. (Peter Utting) According Proff. Peter Utting is agreed that many countries included South Africa did what others do. Focus is in big towns such as Johannesburg, Durban, Middleburg and Cape Town whereas the rural areas are in need of infrastructure.

Structure of the report

The project deals with the investigate the cause leads construction project fail in rural areas. The whole structure of the report have set as follows: Introduction/background, statement of the problem, the aim, objective of the study, research question, research design, literature survey, methodology, definition of terms, and conclusion.

Construction Management

The construction management project delivery system introduces professional management throughout the project acting as an agent of the owner. Owner has separate contracts with the contractor, designer, and construction manager. The role of construction manager as an agent of the owner does not bear any financial risk. The construction manager works closely with the designer and contractor during the design and construction phases in the best interest of the owner.

The construction management entity has expertise in construction and allows the owner to execute complex projects which require extensive coordination between project participants

The construction manager s expertise and involvement improves efficiency of even the

most complex projects by minimizing rework, change orders, and cost overruns. The

construction manager advises the owner in the design and construction stage allowing the owner

have influence throughout the project. This involvement facilitates constructability,

Integrating construction knowledge during the design phase.

The construction manager oversees

Design implementation during construction, often diminishing the designer s role in construction,

but the involvement of the designer in construction differs in each project. In expensive,

complex projects the extra cost of hiring a construction manager is offset by avoiding general

contracting fees, savings in cost management, and the reduction of cost overruns.

There is no delivery approach that is best in every situation. These three systems are the basic frameworks used in most projects. From each of these frameworks many variations and hybrids have evolved and been implemented. Projects may be adapted in any way that may aid in the project delivery and utilize the strengths of all project participants. The best project delivery system will address each of the project s unique needs and characteristics.

Conclusion

In conclusion this study identifies the needs of infrastructure and determines the challenges that municipalities are facing when are searching for information. Construction managers provide valuable construction expertise during design in the construction management delivery system. Acting in this role, development agencies need to involve construction personnel in design. Development agencies can either staff a contractor or hire contractors during the design to gain construction knowledge early. As involving potential contractors in the detailed design phase also provides continuity of construction personnel between the design and construction.

If the contractor is involved early he can express his needs and learn those of the other participants. Through partnering, the parties can understand each other s needs and common goals can be created. However, the owner s goal of a cost-effective project may conflict with the contractor s profit motive. Incorporating these changes into typical project delivery is a viable way to address constructability issues in Honduras. The changes are small and affordable, effectively improving sustainability. Based on the research outlined in this report, shows a proposed delivery system for development work aimed to maximize community participation and involve a contractor in the design.

While we have not tried to argue that multidisciplinary collaborations are the key to radically changing the development in rural, the cases presented do demonstrate that the lack of multidisciplinary collaborations does have a negative impact and does contribute to the failure of many development projects in rural area. More specifically, we have found that without consulting people, information and/or other resources from other sectors:

I. Planners fail to fully understand the complexity of contexts;

II. Planners gravitate towards grandiose, general, sectarian and superficial solutions rather than holistic and strategic ones;

III. Planners, in their developme