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Abstract
The wealth of any nation is gauged by its performance in infrastructure provision through its construction industry. The construction
industry is large, volatile, and requires tremendous capital outlays. For developing economies, road construction constitutes a major
component of the construction industry. This means that much of the national budget on infrastructure development is channelled to
road construction projects. The aim of the study reported in this paper was to identify causes and eects of cost escalation and schedule
delays in road construction projects. Using a detailed literature review, structured interviews and questionnaire surveys, the results of the
study conrmed the prevalence of cost escalation and schedule delays in road construction projects in Zambia. The study established that
bad or inclement weather due to heavy rains and oods, scope changes, environmental protection and mitigation costs, schedule delay,
strikes, technical challenges, ination and local government pressures were the major causes of cost escalation in Zambias road construction projects. On the other hand, delayed payments, nancial processes and diculties on the part of contractors and clients, contract
modication, economic problems, materials procurement, changes in drawings, stang problems, equipment unavailability, poor supervision, construction mistakes, poor coordination on site, changes in specications and labour disputes and strikes were found to be the
major causes of schedule delays in road construction projects. Appropriate project management practices are thus required to curb the
causes and eects of cost escalation and schedule delays in road construction projects.
2008 Elsevier Ltd and IPMA. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Cost escalation; Schedule delays; Road construction industry; Zambia
1. Introduction
Cost and schedule overruns can occur due to a wide
range of causes on various types of projects. If project costs
or schedules exceed their planned targets, client satisfaction
would be compromised. The funding prole would no
longer match the budget requirement and further slippage
in schedule could result. The resulting eects would be detrimental especially in the case of developing countries
whose wealth measure is greatly dependant on their performance in infrastructure provision through the construction
industry, especially on road construction projects which
constitute a major component of the industry.
*
Accountability Oce [8], found that 77% of highway projects in the USA experienced cost escalation. Flyvbjerg
et al. [7] also concluded that nine out of every ten construction projects experienced cost escalation. Most of the cost
escalation is said to occur before construction begins.
Among the many factors identied, GAO/RCED [8] specically noted three:
initial estimates were preliminary and not designed to be
reliable predictors of project costs;
initial estimates were modied to reect more detailed
plans and specications as a project is designed; and
a projects costs were aected by among other things,
ination and changes in scope to accommodate economic considerations that occurs over time as a project
is designed and built.
2. Cost escalation
Cost escalation refers to the increase in the amount of
money required to construct a road project over and above
the original budgeted amount. In the India Infrastructure
Report, Datta [5] described cost escalation as a ubiquitous
problem in government projects. Cost escalation occurs
when actual costs exceed previously estimated values [16].
Schexnayder et al. [25] and Merewitz [18] endeavoured
to nd some of the reasons that lead to cost escalation
and categorized them into two broad groups: uncontrollable and controllable factors.
In a study to identify factors that cause inaccuracies in
cost estimates of highway projects, the Government
523
Table 1
Performance of selected projects in Zambia
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
Name of
project
Start date
Original nish
date
Revised
nish date
Remarks
NyimbaKatete
LusakaMongu
KasamaLuwingu
MpikaKasama
Mpika-Muwele
October
2003
January
2003
October
2001
June 2001
October 2004
July 2005
4.90
5.88
July 2005
On-going
24.25
25.33
Nil
35.00
Nil
2.38
Beyond schedule
Nil
1.30
Failure to commence
KashikishiLunchinda
ChambeshiChinkobo
IsokaMuyombe
ChinsaliNakonde
MpikaChinsali
MutandaKasempa
ChomaNamwala
LuanshyaMpongwe
June 2001
November
2003
December
2002
December
2001
January 2003
Beyond budget,
beyond schedule
Beyond budget,
beyond schedule
Beyond schedule
Nil
37.50
Incomplete work
February
2001
December
2000
April 1999
August 2001
Nil
1.35
Failure to commence
March 2002
August 2002
4.00
5.50
July 2000
2.00
2.00
March
1999
February
1997
November
1994
November
1994
March 2000
November
2000
November
2000
December
2000
Nil
Beyond budget,
beyond schedule
Beyond schedule
1.95
1.95
Beyond schedule
3.84
6.45
2.50
8.60
December
2001
2.53
3.63
Beyond budget,
beyond schedule
Beyond budget,
incomplete work
Beyond budget,
beyond schedule
June 2001
February
1999
February
1998
January 1997
Source: Projects progress report [23] and projects progress report [24].
524
non-excusable delays;
non-compensable excusable delays;
compensable excusable delays; and
concurrent delays.
525
6. Structured interviews
526
three believed that the number of projects that had experienced budget overruns was Negligible.
With the above responses, it was quite clear that this
subject needed to be explored further. The need for further
exploration was especially highlighted from the facts presented in Table 1. Interviewees indicated that in some
cases, funding was so erratic that claims owing to delayed
payments, interest and standing time by contractors
formed a signicant part of the nal total project cost.
Due to delayed payments, project durations increased
and costs escalated. It was also pointed out that due to
political and other inuences; the scope of works on most
government-funded projects could be increased without
due regard to budgetary, schedule and other constraints.
Budget overruns, if not controlled, have the potential to
adversely aect the completion of projects. Stringent management of the various risks that can adversely impact on
increased project costs is thus paramount.
6.1.3. Schedule overruns
Results showed that a signicant number of projects
were not completed within schedule. Six of the interviewees
indicated that Many projects they were involved in had
schedule overruns, three believed that Quite a few projects
had schedule overruns, while one stated that the number of
projects with schedule overruns was Negligible.
The literature reviewed showed that completing projects
within time is one of the biggest challenges facing the construction industry. If risks are not managed well, schedule
overruns are likely to occur. Many risks, apart from
increasing costs, have the tendency to disrupt works, causing delays and hence prolonging the duration of a project.
From the interviews, it was clear that schedule overrun
risks were signicantly high on road projects in Zambia.
Insights from the interviewees showed that due to funding,
design, and unplanned increases in scopes of works, some
projects suered protracted durations. Some of these schedule overruns were so severe that they could increase the
original project durations two, three or even four fold as
evidenced from the information in Table 1 in which projects such as Luanshya-Mpongwe, Kasama-Luwingu and
Kashikishi-Lunchinda roads severely exceeded original
project durations.
6.1.4. Key factors that contribute to projects failing to meet
desired objectives
It was necessary to identify the most important factors
that contributed to some projects falling short of the
desired objectives of cost, time and quality. From their
own experiences, interviewees were requested to pick out
from a given list, factors they considered most signicant
in contributing to projects failing to meet desired
objectives.
Four of the interviewees believed that Poor or erratic
funding contributed most to poor project outcomes. Some
explained that this was more characteristic with projects
that were fully government-nanced. In fact, most of the
Weighted opinion averages of each cause of cost escalation and schedule delays in road construction project were
determined to assess their perceived signicance. The average weighted perceived signicance was then computed
using the formula below:
60
50
Percent of respondents
527
4
P
40
WA
30
F i Ri
1
14
100%
P
4
Fi
1
20
10
Dip in Eng
BEng
Msc in Eng
Academic qualification
Fig. 2. Academic qualications of the respondents.
Percent of respondents
30
20
10
0
5 years or less
11 to 15 years
6 to 10 years
16 years or more
Weighted Average
528
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
Bad
weather
Scope
changes
Env
protection
&
mitigation
costs
Schedule
delay
Strikes
Technical
challenges
Inflation
Local govt
pressures
Table 2
Responsibility and category of the major cause of cost escalation
Causes of cost escalation
Bad weather
Ination
Schedule delay
Scope changes
Local government pressures
Strikes
Technical challenges
Environmental protection and
mitigation costs
Responsibility (who
bares the cost?)
Category of
factor
Shared
Client
Contractor
Client
Client
Contractor
Contractor and
consultant
Client
Uncontrollable
Uncontrollable
Controllable
Controllable
Controllable
Controllable
Controllable
Controllable
529
Fig. 5. Major causes of schedule delay in road projects and their ranking in Zambia.
Table 3
Responsibility and category of the major causes of schedule delays
Causes of delay
Type of delay
Changes in
drawings
Changes in
specications
Material
procurement
Construction
mistakes
Poor supervision
Equipment
unavailability
Financial process
Client
Contractor
Excusable
compensable
Excusable
compensable
Non-excusable
Contractor
Non-excusable
Consultant
Contractor
Non-excusable
Non-excusable
Client
Financial diculties
Client
Delayed payments
Client
Economic problems
Client
Contractor
Excusable
compensable
Excusable
compensable
Excusable
compensable
Excusable
compensable
Non-excusable
Consultant
Client
Contractor
Contractor
Excusable
compensable
Non-excusable
Non-excusable
nancial processes in client organisations and nancial difculties that accompany the delayed release of funds by client organisations, contract modications, and economic
hardships. Materials procurement, changes in drawings,
Stang problems, equipment unavailability, poor supervision, construction mistakes, poor coordination on site,
changes in specications and labour disputes were among
the major causes of schedule delays.
These factors combine to impede the rate of delivery of
road infrastructure and consequently the rate of national
development. Delays and any cost overruns tend to unbalance the initial cost benet analyses conducted, considering
much of the money used to construct the roads is borrowed
and has to be paid back with interest. All the factors identied in this study need to be carefully managed so as to
avoid risks that are attributable to them. This calls for
improved risk and project management practices by clients,
contractors and consultants.
Lastly, the small sample size of 26 respondents to the
questionnaire survey poses some limitations to the extent
to which the results of the study could be generalised.
Due to this limitation, the survey may not have identied
all the possible factors that could cause cost escalation
and schedule delays and their eects in road construction
projects in Zambia. However, this notwithstanding, the
study made a signicant attempt at identifying the major
causes of cost escalation and schedule delays in road construction projects in Zambia.
16. Recommendations
There are no straightforward solutions to the challenges
of cost escalation and schedule delays in road construction
projects. There are, however, steps that can be taken to
minimise their causes and eects, the major one being the
use of ecient project management tools and practices.
For the specic factors that cause cost escalation and schedule delays in road construction projects in Zambia, the
following recommendations are suggested.
16.1. Project timing and scheduling
The projects earmarked for construction should be
properly planned and timed in such a way that most of
the works can be executed in seasons of clement weather.
Except for long contracts which take more than one year,
the projects should be executed between early April and
early December, which is the dry season in Zambia. This
530
531
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