Prof. Peter Barrett gives lecture on “The important place of construction in the economy (using results from the revaluing construction work)”

The School of Engineering and Technology (AIT Thailand) conducted a seminar with the theme “The important place of construction in the economy (using results from the revaluing construction work)” last 19 October 2009. Professor Peter Barrett was invited to be the guest speaker for this event. Prof. Barrett is currently Professor in Construction and Property Management of the University of Salford.

Dr. Chotchai Charoenngam, Associate Professor, CEIM-SET and around 40 Ph. D. and Master Students attended this event.

Prof. Peter Barrett and Dr. Chotchai Charoenngam after the lecture.

Group photo : Prof. Barrett and Dr. Chotchai (center) together with CEIM staff, Ph. D. and M. S. students


About the Speaker
Peter is President of the UN-established International Council for Research and Innovation in Building and Construction (CIB) involving 2000 experts in 60 countries. He is a past Director of Salford’s top rated, 6* Research Institute for the Built and Human Environment and is currently Chairman of the £5M EPSRC funded, Salford Centre for Research and Innovation. From 2001 - 2008 Professor Barrett was Pro-Vice Chancellor for Research with overall responsibility for all research across Salford University, which in this period grew from involving 38% to 60% of academic staff. See Research and Graduate College,Peter is a Fellow of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors and in 1989 was the first Chartered Building Surveyor to gain a PhD. He has since supervised and supported a wide range of Post Graduate students. To date he has produced over one hundred and seventy single volume publications, refereed papers and reports, and has made over one hundred and ten presentations in around sixteen countries. Professor Barrett has undertaken a wide range of research, typified by a management focus around real world problems using a range of hard and soft research methods. He is currently focusing on the theme of Revaluing Construction with a particular interest in the links between Senses, Brain and Spaces.

AIT-CV August 2009 Intake for CEIM and MPM Field of Studies

The AIT-CV Hanoi branch accepted 13 students for August 2009 semester. Twelve (12) students are now enrolled in Professional Master in Project Management and one (1) MS student for Construction, Engineering and Infrastructure Management.

In AIT-CV Ho Chi Minh City Branch, twenty four (24) students are currently registered; four (4) MS students and one (1) Ph. D. for Construction, Engineering and Infrastructure Management, while nineteen (19) students for Professional Master in Project Management field of study.

Below is the complete list of AIT-CV students.

Hanoi Branch

No. Name Field
1. Mr. Tran Van Trung - MPM
2. Mr. Pham Nhu Dung - MPM
3. Ms. Le Ngoc Diep - MPM
4. Mr. Doan Thai Duong - MPM
5. Mr. Le Nam Binh - MPM
6. Mr. Pham Van Thanh - MPM
7. Mr. Le Van Thu - MPM
8. Mr. Nguyen Trung Kien - MPM
9. Mr. Nguyen Duy Duc Thu - MPM
10. Mr. Dinh Quang Hiep - MPM
11. Mr. Bui Duc Luong - MPM
12. Mr. Vu Van Cao - MPM
13. Ms. Nguyen Phung Hai - CEIM


Ho Chi Minh City Branch

No. Name Field

1. Mr. Nguyen Tuan Tu - CEIM
2. Mr. Bui Duy Khanh - CEIM
3. Mr. Nguyen Quoc Trung - CEIM
4. Mr. Duong Quang Minh - CEIM
5. Mr. Ha Cong Huy - CEIM - Ph. D.
6. Mr. Bui Kim Binh - MPM
7. Mr. Nguyen Phan Hoa Binh - MPM
8. Mr. Truong Thai Binh - MPM
9. Mr. Le Minh Đang - MPM
10. Mr. Truong Ngoc Dung - MPM
11. Mr. Nguyen Duy Thien Giang- MPM
12. Ms. Trinh Thi Thu Ha - MPM
13. Mr. Bien Nam Hai - MPM
14. Mr. Vo Si Hoai - MPM
15. Mr. Bui Hai Nam - MPM
16. Mr. Ha Chi Nghia - MPM
17. Mr. Nguyen Van Nhan - MPM
18. Mr. Nguyen Chanh Phuong - MPM
19. Mr. Nguyen Le Thuan - MPM
20. Mr. Le Mien Thuy - MPM
21. Ms. Nguyen Thu Trang - MPM
22. Mr. Nguyen Duc Trong - MPM
23. Mr. Nguyen Quoc Viet - MPM
24. Ms. Nguyen Thi Vui - MPM

Knowledge Management in the Construction Project Environment

The construction industry, wherein the highest capital investment is drawn up at the construction stage, is one intensely competitive business with a high risk and low profit margin. Currently, the construction industry still encounters the consequences of construction delays, cost overruns and delivery failures (Beatham et. al., 2004). Issues of controversy have been on means of improving the construction industry from a less productive and poorly organized set-up to a fully effective and yet remain highly competitive. The use of knowledge in organizations has been increasingly seen as a basis for enhancing a competitive advantage (Krogh et. al., 2000; Goh, 2002, Carrillo, 2004). The challenges therefore lie in the means of managing knowledge resources and capabilities, contributing to project success and sustained organizational competitiveness.

In Thailand and other developing countries, construction projects have inadequate and ineffective control strategies towards project management problems. The operational modes of contractors are mainly based on sole ownership, headed by entrepreneurs lacking efficient expertise in construction management. Evidently, the most important factor inhibiting the successful completion of a construction project is the scarcity of skilled personnel at all levels of construction personnel especially supervisors (Ofori 1985; Imbert 1990; Mackenzie et al., 2000). However, most owners do not want to incur expenditures on employing qualified professionals to compliment and enhance management competency.

Mr. Wasan Teerajetgul made a case study to examine the key knowledge influencing factors (individual and organizational factors) and the knowledge creation process that affects construction project team creativity, and his research mainly focused on the practice of knowledge management in Thai construction projects at the on-site work level. The following are his specific objectives to: (1) identify knowledge factors influencing on-site construction; (2) examine the current practice of knowledge factors in association with the knowledge creation process and project team creativity during the course of on-site construction; (3) examine the influence of key knowledge factors and the knowledge creation process on project team creativity; and (4) propose improved mechanisms of knowledge creation process for on-site construction.

In his analyses, he identified the knowledge factors influencing on-site construction works using Varimax rotation. These analytical techniques showed that that there are six important knowledge factors with 36 items under each. These knowledge factors are: 1) visionary leadership, 2) reward or incentive, 3) collaboration, 4) trust, 5) information technology, and 6) individual competency or skills. Analyses of components of the knowledge creation process revealed that a total of 21 items are under the four dimensions of socialization, externalization, combination, and internalization.

The results of the study showed that majority of respondents tend to mostly rate their assessment between somewhat and agree on the scale of measurement. This could be attributed to respondent’s particular reluctance to disclose negative perceptions about knowledge management practices. As peculiar to the Thai culture, Thais are generally hesitant to openly critique others and issues of concern.

IT support has the largest effect and uniquely contributed to the knowledge creation process. Such result automatically reflects the complexity of engineering knowledge that requires rich technology applications such as the use of 3D simulations. IT allows construction engineers to retrieve critical information, incorporate information with their experiences and enhance additional opportunities to create new concepts by sharing knowledge and techniques with each other. Nonaka and Takeuchi (1995) argued that the IT networks have proved to be a limited means for disseminating tacit knowledge. They address the added importance of human networks than IT networks.

Experience provides individuals with the opportunity to create knowledge through trial-and-error learning. Experience also affects individuals’ ability or competency to transfer knowledge (Argote et al., 2003). Individual competency is a set of skills, related knowledge, and attributes that allow an individual to perform a task or an activity within the scope of a specific function or job.

The results also showed that there is a significant influence of the overall knowledge creation process on project team creativity. In this study, if each part of the knowledge creation process is perceived as mutually exclusive, then only internalization comes into the limelight. Internalization significantly affects project team creativity. Schonstrom (2005) discussed that when knowledge is transferred, it is suggested that knowledge has to be first internalized by the receiving individual before it can be used. The internalized learning through problem-solving facilitated construction engineers in becoming experts and therefore they could use existing knowledge to create products, stimulate innovations and creativity in addition to much more. The results explain that internalization is the process whereby one increases knowledge by learning from external events such as work and apprenticeship.

Contribution to Practice
This research established evidence on how construction project teams adopted the knowledge creation process to improve its project performance. Thai construction managers are seen to place emphasis individual competency or tacit knowledge. Their flexible thoughts and engineering techniques were elements of tacit knowledge fundamental to foster knowledge management and creativity. The strength of knowledge management rests on the vision and aspiration of construction managers in applying creativity in on-site knowledge practices. By having appropriate and attractive incentives, competent project teams were brought in to utilize and generate new knowledge in the form of problem solving. In order to make knowledge visible, the competency in using IT to convert conceptual ideas and package knowledge into obvious activities must be inherent. IT is seen to facilitate the knowledge creation process by capturing knowledge in real time and thereafter, making it accessible for future use. IT greatly benefits construction projects in that it speeds up the project team’s decision making process and thus shortens the product life cycle. The knowledge creation process is seen to facilitate the improvement of project performance. In conclusion, successful execution of construction projects requires that project managers to consider the above-mentioned three important factors.

Contribution to Research
The following are summarized contributions of this research to the body of knowledge in construction projects at large.

1. This study establishes the new instrument for measuring knowledge factors, knowledge creation, and project team creativity in Thai construction.
2. The study provides opportunity to facilitate and to manage the key knowledge factors identified and knowledge creative environment for improving competitive advantage.
3. The research proposes improved mechanisms of knowledge creation that will generate effective practices in a construction project environment, for example, fostering knowledge sharing culture (employee exchange knowledge as standard operating procedure), providing knowledge vision, platform or community of practice, and knowledge process, and knowledge delegation etc.
4. These improved mechanisms can be applied at all levels of construction organizations that need to improve its knowledge management process.

His thesis abstract is copied and posted.

Abstract

The research focuses on the practice of knowledge management practice in Thai construction projects at on-site work level with the objectives as follows: 1) to identify knowledge factors including individual and organizational factors influencing on-site construction execution; 2) to examine the current practice status of knowledge factors in association with knowledge creation process and project team creativity; 3) to examine the influences of key knowledge factors and knowledge creation process on project team creativity; and 4) to propose an improving mechanism of knowledge creation process at on-site construction.

The design of this research is cross-sectional and uses a blended methodological approach of both quantitative and qualitative methods. The research model includes the following variables: a) six knowledge factors: vision of leadership, trust, collaboration, incentives, Information Technology (IT) support, and individual competencies, b) four knowledge creation processes: socialization, externalization, combination, and internalization, and c) team creativity

At the beginning stage, the qualitative method using focus-group interviews is used due to the novel nature of knowledge management practice in Thai construction. This method helps the researcher to obtain some rich data. The quantitative method is used when exploring the effects of the knowledge factors, the knowledge creation process, on the project team creativity. Then, the study results are verified through the qualitative method by using a case study again.

Survey data from 70 construction projects in Thai construction firms, obtained in second stage by means of a questionnaire developed by the researcher, were collated and analyzed. As a means of testing the model, regression analysis techniques were used to analyze the data. Consistent with previous empirical evidence, three knowledge factors affected the knowledge creation process: incentives, IT, and individual competencies. It was noted that these factors overlay the knowledge creation process at all execution stages of on-site construction. In other, only internalization of knowledge creation process affected project team creativity. It was presented that construction members had focused largely on managers’ conception as individual.
This research is expected to contribute to a better understanding of important knowledge factors and knowledge management research in Thai construction which is still at an infancy stage. In order to build a knowledge creative culture, construction project executives need to support and maximize the value of human assets (individual competencies). Furthermore, facilitating IT-supported knowledge management in construction projects needs to be considered and emphasized needs to be placed on productive work and gain a competitive advantage.

Risk Management In Port & Waterway Projects: A Case Study Of The Southern Focal Economic Area Of Vietnam

Facility construction involves a wide variety of risks. Factors impacting owner investment decisions can be quite complex and may vary significantly from region to region and project to project. Contractors face similar difficulties when they consider working outside of their resident jurisdiction. The risks arise from many areas such as legal requirements, construction systems, technology, and management techniques. The success of a specific venture, and in some cases the viability of an organization, can hinge on an understanding of the risks associated with such projects. Construction projects that fail to meet scope, budget, and schedule can result in a host of impacts with serious economic, social, and political ramifications.

Many experts agreed that the company that earned the highest profit has a good risk management system. Management of Risk (MoR) is not only about avoiding explosions or natural disasters. In fact for most businesses it is about profit. And many businesses do it without really understanding how better risk management could help their organization achieve its goals. Risk management proponents say that the better the organization is at managing risk, the more profitable it will be.

In summary, a certain amount of risk taking is inevitable, and even to be encouraged, if an organization is to achieve its objectives. Objective management and acceptance of risk helps to improve performance by contributing to:
a. Increased certainty and fewer surprises
b. Better service delivery
c. More effective management of change
d. More efficient use of resources
e. Better management at all levels through improved decision making
f. Reduced waste and fraud, and better value for money
g. Innovation
h. Management of contingent and maintenance activities

Although there are many improvements of management in Vietnam, the construction industry still has to face many changes in both market and government policies. The causes are many but one of them is the lack of attentiveness with the important of the risk management process.

Besides, the value of systematic risk management of project activity is not fully recognized by the construction industry (Walewski, et al. 2002). Since no common view of risk exists, owners, investors, designers, and constructors have differing objectives and adverse relationships between the parties are common. Attempts at coordinating risk analysis management between all of the project participants have not been formalized and this is especially true between contractors and owners.

Moreover, the construction engineers were not familiar with the risk management issues and they found it was hard when working in a competitive climate, especially in a project. Because of lack of knowledge of management and risk management, they were not preferred with the relevant works such as planning than the technical issues like designing or calculating structural. Thus it is understandable if they were unaware of risks and less concerned of risk management. Therefore, a study of risks and risk management is necessary and beneficial to all of the construction industry in general and Port & Waterway Projects particularly. In summary, the problems are stated as follow:
§ The ambiguous of risks and risk management of the Vietnamese engineers.
§ The lack of awareness and knowledge of risk management.

Mr. Nguyen Viet Dung made a case study which focused on the management of risks in P&W projects in Southern Focal Economic Area (SFEA). The framework of his research started with the findings of risk management that include risk management planning, risk identification, risk analysis, risk response and risk monitoring and control which followed by the analysis and the discussion. Based on the collected information, improvement suggestions will be made to improve effectiveness in risk management in port and waterway projects in SFEA of Vietnam. His specific objectives were:
§ Finding the potential risks and how are they managed in P&W projects
§ Suggest how to effectively manage risks in port & waterway projects.

His study was conducted with the intention of giving more benefit to the engineers working on P&W projects though it could be useful for other fields of the construction industry. He found out that the most important risks consisted of 1) corruption and bribery, 2) budget viable (contractor), 3) incompetent project team, 4) changes in law and regulation, and 5) inadequate designer.

He investigated two projects were the picture of risk management in P&W projects was clearly defined. In both studied projects, they have formal processes of risk management and are constantly improving by practicing experience. The process consisted of 4 main stages:
1. Risk management planning - although most of interviewees agreed about its importance, it is still not utilized carefully. Project budget and project management plan are important and usually used.
2. Risk identification and analysis - performance is quite fine. A few formal standards have been applied and encouraged the engineers to participate. The project budget is considered as the most concerned subject, while business environment factors are accounted to cope with changes in the market. Tools and techniques which based on historical data and experience are highly utilized. The engineers prefer easy and convenient methods to do their work when it proves useful and is accepted by the authorities.
3. Risk response - mitigation and sharing are mostly utilized and have high effectiveness when these strategies could make the stakeholders reach agreement without arising disputes and losing time. Thus the experts with high skill of negotiation are needed to motivate the relevant parties and ensure the success of the agreement.
4. Risk monitoring and control - though new risks appearing in the project life aren’t identified very well, it is successful in other means. By applying “risk audit” and “technical performance measurement”, the risk responses and risk management process is evaluated and necessary activities will be implemented to ensure the success of achieving the project’s objectives. However new risks could be major problems if they are ignored, especially in complex projects where risks can’t be recognized fully in identification stage. Therefore applying the strategies to continuously uncover the new risks such as “risk reassessment” is suggested to make the risk management process concrete.

At present, risk management is still a new area in the management field. Therefore, facing difficulties are frequent and unavoidable.

Mr. Dung found out that although the founded general attitude was that risk management was already so much of concern. Thus if more effort was put into it, no other work would get done. He also found out that the transferring of risks and risk management knowledge from project to project was poor. The interviewees admitted that even if they proposed a new solution and put serious effort into transferring that knowledge to others, but it would be difficult even within their own organization.

In theory, although many methods of carrying out risk management processes are presented, they were not in practice. Some of the interviewees were working with risk management, and they admitted that they had little knowledge about risk management methods. Professionalism and experience are very important in identifying and managing risks, but it is necessary to encourage larger participants and apply more appropriate tools and techniques.

Formal methods of communicating and of sharing experiences and knowledge of risks and risk management were missing or inadequate. That is why in order to secure the activities of the project, it is important to adapt the most suitable approach. Therefore, risk management courses for all construction project engineers are necessary to increase the level of knowledge of formal risk management processes. Furthermore, understanding its benefits would increase the willingness to invest in risk management and capabilities to do it.

His thesis abstract is copied and posted

Abstract
Project risk management has been a subject of intensive discussion in recent years. Still, research on how project risk management should be adopted is inadequate. The objectives of this study are to identify the risks and how to manage risks in Port and Waterway (P&W) Projects. The focus of the study is on the means for risk management. The purpose is to emphasize the importance and requirement of risk management.

The study was conducted with 7 interviews in two different P&W projects and mainly targeted to the engineers involved in the projects. Literature searches were mostly done by using AIT library materials and databases.
Empirical study was used to show the application area for risk management derived from literature. Based on this, a picture of risk management in P&W projects was formed. The basic idea of the picture is to sensitize the engineers regarding the potential risks and suggest how to manage them. According to the understanding gained during this study, it is suggested that by enabling more caution of risk management methods, project risk management will become more efficient and the inefficient and costly activities identified would be reduced.

Factors In Power Purchase Agreements Affecting Investment Flows In Independent Power Production In The Nepalese Environment

“Public private partnerships (PPPs)” have a critical role to play in implementing the development projects in developing countries. Traditionally, the responsibility of constructing and operating infrastructure facilities had rested with the government, but with the growth of economy outstripping infrastructure supply (Gupta and Sravat, 1998) and the need for providing infrastructure facilities to keep up the pace of development, the burden of infrastructure development has been shifted to private sector through concession contracts such as Build-Own-Transfer (BOT). As the term implies, public private partnership is a structure that implements and carries infrastructure projects into effect on a basis of partnership, each sector contributing what it does best.

In South Asia, private participation in electricity was oriented mainly towards building generation capacity also in the form of independent power producers (IPP). This focus reflects the need in the region to expand generation capacity to keep pace with expected demand. Nepal alone with substantial hydropower capacity will require an investment estimated to be US$ 1.8 billion (Private Participation in Infrastructure: Trends in Developing Countries in 1990-2001, 2001) for the expansion of the power sector for domestic demand over the next ten years. With the declining trend of availability of scarce public resources soft loans and grants from multilateral and bilateral agencies, such financial resources will have to be mobilized through the private sector, in the form of IPPs.

Despite having a feasible generation potential of about 43000 MW and with a demand growth rate of about 10%, Nepal's current total installed capacity is only about 526MW with only 40% of the total population having access to electricity. The quality of the supply is poor, system losses high, and power shortages persistent. The cost of electricity for the consumers in Nepal is also one of the highest in South Asia.

Project Sponsors and lenders seek to reap adequate returns in stable environments, minimizing political, financial, operational and other risks associated with the project ensuring a steady stream of revenues.

Likewise, the state owned public enterprises will want to limit the abuses of monopoly power by the private operator and will seek to maximize production efficiency. The responsibility of the state owned enterprises also lies in ensuring the appropriate quality, environment, health standards and social justice.

Similarly, other stakeholders to IPPs have interests ranging from social welfare from the project company to reasonable costs of services.

Private hydropower production is still in the phase of evolution in Nepal, and the process is proving to be slow and expensive. Prospective developers continue to face risks and difficulties and fifteen years after the introduction of the Hydropower Development Policy in the early 1990s, the government of Nepal has only been able to attract limited private investments in power generation.

As pointed out by Head (2000), all private infrastructure development carries common risks such as political, currency exposure, force majeure etc. but hydropower is perceived as being exposed to additional risks in project definition, risks in hydrology, environment, financing, and regulatory risks. Even straightforward issues like scheduled outages and contract energy have led to disputes in PPAs in the Nepalese environment. Therefore, in the process of designing PPAs, a variety of questions need to be asked about the best feasible means satisfying the concerned parties allowing them to come to a zone of possible agreement.

Mr. Raju B. Shrestha made a research which aimed to 1) identify the underlying factors in PPAs in hydropower production in the Nepalese environment; b) identify how the principle issues affect the stakeholders; and 3) identify ways to address the principle issues

He believed that the benefits of his study will have contributions to the body of knowledge pertaining to PPAs in the Nepalese environment.
· Assessment of the underlying factors for project sponsors, utilities, lenders and the host Government.
· The impact of the underlying factors to the concerned parties.
· Positions of the concerned parties, their shared interests, and uncertainties.
· The strategy to adopt for future projects.

His analyses of the PPAs concluded to date, and the perception study of the prime stakeholders has shown the following:
· The analyses of the PPAs concluded to date in the Nepalese environment have shown that discriminatory clauses and unequal treatment are present in the key issues of the agreements.
· The prime stakeholders have divergent perceptions in the key issues of the PPAs, and that not all the clauses have been acceptable to the parties concerned. The responses of the prime stakeholders of the contracting parties reflect the past trends and practices in PPAs between the utility and the IPPs of various types.

From this study, the contracting parties can better evaluate future projects as well as negotiate the terms in the PPAs and provide suitable alternatives wherever required. The past trends of PPAs, the degree of convergence of opinions in each clause in terms of its importance and its importance in inclusion in PPAs can be evaluated. This will facilitate the contracting parties in negotiations to come to agreement sooner and successfully conclude PPAs.

The responses regarding the clauses of the PPAs of the other major stakeholders, namely the lenders and the government, will further help in facilitating successful conclusion of PPAs. His conclusions are categorized in 5 aspects such as:

1. Power Purchase Guarantees
a. Take or Pay Clauses
b. Purchase Guarantees of Interim Energy
c. Supply Guarantee of Minimum energy
d. Purchase Guarantee of Excess Energy
e. Two Part Tariff- Demand Charge
f. Third Party Sales Guarantees

The clauses in the PPAs are more favourable to IPPs with foreign investment than IPPs with local investment with guarantees of purchase of excess energy, interim energy, and better escalation rates, more coverage from exposure to political and changes in law risks.
· The clauses of the PPAs with investment in JV with the Utility have favourable clause for the project sponsors with better escalation rates and purchase guarantees of excess and interim energy than projects with local investment, and explicit clause covering political risks.
· Take or pay clause has not been favourable to the utility as it has resulted in losses.

2. Force Majeure Guarantees
a. Political Risk s
b. Natural Disasters
c. Changes in Law
d. Buyout Clauses

3 Financial and Foreign Exchange Guarantees
a. Convertibility
b. Repatriation
c. Devaluation
d. Escalation
f. Tax Holidays
g. Concessional Funding

4. Operation Risks
a. Dispatch Rights
b. Scheduled Outages
c. Availability Declaration
d. Maintenance Clauses

5 Other Risk Mitigating Measures
a. Dispute resolution Methods
b. Informal Dispute Resolution Methods
c. Arbitration
d. Insurance
e. Insurance Before RCOD
f. Insurance after RCOD

His thesis abstract is copied and posted.
ABSTRACT
With the Introduction of Hydropower Development Policy in the early 1990s, combined with the changes in electricity legislation and the opening up of the power industry to the private sector, Independent Power producers (IPPs) have been playing a bigger role in the development of the electricity sector. However, further investment in this sector has been difficult to mobilize, and part of this difficulty can be attributed to the factors in the existing Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs) and inconsistencies in the guarantees provided by the state owned utility.
The research provides the underlying factors in PPAs in hydropower production in the Nepalese environment, which are of most significance to the stakeholders of independent power production. The research is carried out with a triangulation approach taking into account both the qualitative viewpoint, in the form of comparative studies; and quantitative viewpoint, a questionnaire survey, regarding issues of PPAs.
From a pool of existing independent power producers, 10 PPAs are compared for patterns of specific variables by examining, categorizing and tabulating the underlying factors of PPAs. Opinions in the form of a questionnaire are sought from the stakeholders and the means of the ranks tested by Kruskal-Wallis tests to see if the perceptions of the stakeholders differ in the key issues of PPAs. Further, Mann-whitney tests are carried out to examine the difference in the perception between the pairs of stakeholders in the key issues of PPAs.
The research shows that discriminatory clauses and unequal treatment are present in key issues of the agreements. Questionnaire survey of the stakeholder’s shows the significant clauses of the PPAs and the clauses most likely to be included in PPAs by the stakeholders. With the knowledge of the underlying factors in PPAs, the research allows the stakeholders of the power production to clearly understand the positions of the parties involved. The parties can combine their shared interests to create a joint value and deal with multiple issues and make trades between them, eventually both the parties getting something that they value.

A Study Of Safety Management System And Audit In Oil And Gas Construction Projects In Ba Ria – Vung Tau, Vietnam

According to the report of International Labour Organization (URL 10, Website of ILO), 270 million accidents and 2.2 million deaths at work happened every year. Safety issues recently are the major problems and concerns in the construction industry in developing countries. Many efforts have been made to address this problem, but the results have been far from satisfactory when the number of accidents in construction and in industry continued to increasingly dominate. For these reasons, Safety Management System (SMS) including safety audits, safety programs, safety planning and safety tools are reasonably developed and gradually improved.

Oil and gas industry is one of important businesses in many countries including Vietnam nowadays. Currently, with the economic growth of 7%, Vietnam placed in the third rank in the field of oil production among Association of South East Asian Nations countries, after Indonesia and Malaysia (URL1, Website of CNN). With this rate, Vietnam will become the world's 30th largest oil-producing nation in the world (Brown, 2005).

Consequently, a safety auditing in oil and gas project becomes more essential in view of preventing the increasing accidents. This is the new topic which can support the management system and enhancement of effective SMS in the oil and gas industry. Occupational safety and health in Vietnam has been a serious issue for many years. The number of deaths is continuously increasing, while the number of accident is still too high compared with other counties in the world. (Website of Department of Occupational Safety, 2006 and Vietnamese Government Reports of Ministry of Labors)

Especially, construction field always takes the major percent in the number of accidents, death and severe injuries. At present, safety regulation and enforcement in Vietnam is still not adequate. Safety research, in addition, has not been extensively conducted. Lam (2004) and Van (2002) mentioned that the safety management system has not been properly implemented while safety researches are limited. In some countries, although SMS has been applied, the accident rate is still high. Through the use of Safety Audit System, Rowlinson and Lam (2006) revealed the strengths and weaknesses of SMS. The importance of safety audit is noted as followed:

Traditional approaches to benchmarking risk management and safe work performance with incident rate reduction have failed to provide a strong connection between program causes and direct factors influencing risk and loss frequency, Huang and Brubaker (2006). Workplace Audits are shown to be a common form of measuring an organization’s safety performance. Beside, safety auditing is not only the process in determining the ultimate value of an overall safety program, but also the activities examined those that will have the greatest impact.

Mr. Phan Thanh Hai made a case study which main objective was to identify the Safety Management System Practices and Safety Audit Processes and Factors in Vietnam Oil and Gas Construction Project and proposed some recommendations for the improvements of the studied system.
He found out that in construction field of Oil and Gas industry, the Safety Management System has still faced with many problems, and audit safety is using to solve these issues and improve the system. By the measurement method, Organizations or Companies are able to do business each other in their belief, safety and prestige. This auditing approach is also a better method than inspection.

However, the Safety Auditing System is new and strange in construction projects, so it still reveals some weaknesses and limitations. These pitfalls are what an effective auditing method is, how to use auditing tools, and how to make the effective checklist.

During his data collection, he intended to conduct his study with five companies with five identified projects, but there were only three Companies who participated and five of their projects were permitted to be studied. Luckily, ten people were able to arrange their time to join the studied interview in order to get the overview of SMS. However, at least, these situations satisfied his requirement.

His conclusions are elaborated below.
1. Safety management system – these practices are identified in the five projects. The studied methods were the observation, the documentation review and the interviews. The author got the overall of SMS (include Safety Auditing System). Besides, the expert interviews strengthened this awareness. Finally, SMS of the five projects might be clearly known before the safety auditing was studied.

2. Safety auditing process practice – this is the most important objective of this study. The auditing process was also identified by Observation, Documentation, Interviews, and especially Checklists. The Checklist was formed by necessary activities of the SMS audit. The auditor could use many auditing skills to compile, use and evaluate SMS. The request of auditing was that marking and comments had to fill a majority of Checklist’s activities during the audit.

To end the audit, a re-auditing was suggested to implement after the follow-up had given out. It was operated whenever the previous auditing had taken note of unmeasured activities. With five types of Safety Auditing Process, the common process had ever been practiced followed six stages such as 1) Audit Team; 2)Prepare; 3) Implementation; 4) Analysis and report; 5) Follow – up; and 6) Re-audit

3. Safety management system improvements - the Safety Management System Evaluation is found out at the last step of this Study. Five Projects and seven parts of their SMS are evaluated by the audit activities of Projects. It revealed that some international projects have more audit activities than domestic project. And two parts Leadership & Administration and Follow-up System are concerned more than others, whereas two parts Training and Implementation are not concerned properly in oil and gas projects.

According the result of Mr. Hai’s study, activities of part leadership and administration and part follow-up are important of Safety Audit System. They were listed in the Checklist more frequently than that of others. That means they were checked in all studies projects. Activities of part leadership and administration are considered as a necessary part of the Safety Management System.

Besides, the part follow-up also has more activities. They are useful to the audit in order to determine follow-up activities of many emergencies which are particular in the oil and gas construction projects, such as fire case, explosion case, on-site accident case etc. So, the audit has more activities of this part in the checklist.

Finally, during the audit, the auditor was responsible for checking many activities. Among them, activities of leadership, administration and follow-up are the most necessarily important. These parts are the target to reduce accidents in oil and gas construction projects. For this reason, oil and gas construction projects should have a good Standard, effective administration and practical follow up systems.

His thesis abstract is copied and posted.

Abstract
Safety was not only a concern of many companies, but also an unavoidable problem of many projects in oil and gas industry which currently was the strongest industry in Vietnamese manufacture and business. Thus, Safety Management System (SMS) was gradually improved by many new management practices which one of them was the Safety Auditing System (SAS). This system could evaluate SMS or any other systems with a checklist which is actually a list of activities set up to support the audit planning. The checklist is also the auditing tool to estimate the Safety System with some key markings (NC, NA, YES and OBS). Therefore, the study objectives were set to identify SMS practices and find out processes of the safety audit in oil and gas construction projects. To meet these requirements, three companies and five projects were studied. Five SMSs were identified by observation, interview and documentation in order to get the overview. Five auditing processes were also studied to evaluate these current SMS. Finally, the result of the study was the common process which had been implemented and applied to evaluate SMS effectively. The more activities of the auditing Checklist which were marked with position key (YES), the better SMS was. Moreover, another result was comments of SMS practices in oil and gas construction projects. It can be noticed that SMS in international projects was better than others; and in the Safety Management System, Administration & Follow-up were concerned more than other parts in order to support fully all usual and emergency activities on the project sites.

An Examination of the Relationship Between Risk Allocation and Project Success on PPP Projects Through Good Project Governance Assessment Case Studies

One of the key factors that have significant and positive influence on economic growth, especially in the developing countries, is infrastructure development (ADB, 1996).
However, infrastructure development requires massive capital investments because most infrastructure projects are large in size and have a high level of complexity (Grimsey & Lewis, 2002). Due to the capital-intensive nature of infrastructure projects, most developing countries do not have the required amount of capital to develop the necessary infrastructure on their own.

Without the required capital, these nations would not be able to properly develop their infrastructure sector, and without these developments their economic condition could suffer. Therefore, in order to keep pace with the economic growth and the increasing demand from the ever-growing population, the private sector participation was introduced with the intention to assist the government of these developing countries by providing additional capital investment to finance the infrastructure sector development (Walker & Smith, 1995).

However, the private participation in infrastructure in the East Asia and Pacific region is not regarded as a challenger or rival, instead it is utilized to complement the investment made by government agencies and/or state-owned enterprises. As a result of this approach, private participation is not utilized to increase the efficiency of the existing enterprises but rather to build new assets through Greenfield projects (World Bank, 2002). A Greenfield project is a project where a particular private entity or a public-private joint venture builds and operates a new facility for a period of time, which has been determined previously in the project contract, and the facility itself may be returned to the public sector at the end of the concession period (Beery & Crow, 2003). These projects can be broken down into several sub-classes, such as buildlease-own, build-own-transfer, build-own-operate-transfer, build-own-operate, build-operate-transfer, etc. However, the build-operate-transfer (BOT) approach is widely accepted as the preferred form of infrastructure financing, not only in Asia but also in many countries around the world (Lombardo, 1999).

Private sector participation had actually existed as early as the 17th century (Walker & Smith, 1995); however, there are currently still a lot of projects with private participation that have failed. There are several things that could cause these types of projects to fail and they are mostly due to the following reasons (Kumaraswany & Zhang, 2001):
1. Poor arrangement and coordination between government agencies in packaging the projects.
2. Insufficient legal arrangements.
3. Lack of coordination between private and public sectors.
4. The unwillingness of the host government to provide guarantees against the risks originating from the unstable economical and political environment.

The results of previous studies on risk allocation and project success is still insufficient because they have not been able to assess whether or not the risks have been properly allocated, which party actually has the ability and willingness to accept the consequences of these risks and what needs to be done to achieve proper risk allocation. Therefore, there is a need to develop a guideline that can help assess the ability and willingness of the parties that are involved in these kinds of projects to help achieve proper risk allocation and ultimately project success.

Mr. Martinus P. Abednego made a case study on PPP as his dissertation thesis for his Ph. D. degree. The main objective of his research is to assess the relationships between risk allocation and project success by developing a common ground concept of proper risk allocation and utilize its result as the foundation to produce a guideline that can help determine proper risk allocation arrangement at the project initiation stage as well as perform as a control system for the project and its participants along the concession period of a tollway project developed under PPP procurement system. From his main objective, several sub-objectives were further elaborated as follows:
1. To identify the project risks in each stage of project development based on the perceptions of the public sector (government agencies) and private sectors (concessionaire and contractors).
2. To identify the critical success factors that are significant for project success based on the goals and objectives of the public and private sectors.
3. To investigate the risk allocation arrangements used by the public and private sectors.
4. To investigate the influence of risk allocation arrangements on project success.

Moreover, the expected outcomes from his research are:
􀀁 An improved theory of relationship between risk allocation and project success, especially in tollway projects that are developed under PPP procurement system.
􀀁 A conceptual framework of good project governance (GPG) for assessing proper risk allocation so that it may enhance the project performance thus achieving an overall project success.

In his overall conclusions, he cited that Public-Private Partnership can be defined in many ways depending on which perspective one chooses. Regardless of differences in perspective, all possess similar characteristics (Peters, 1998). These characteristics can be summarized into a general perception of PPP as a form of partnership of at least one public and one private entity in which each entity contributes its key resource(s) with a willingness to accept the consequences that are associated with the responsibilities. Accordingly, a lot of advantages can be obtained from its implementation, especially in the development of public infrastructure. One of the main advantages is in terms of project financing. Unfortunately what generally happens is the exact opposite, especially when it is put into practice in countries such as Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam that has less or no experience regarding the approach. The common misconception of the PPP procurement system is that the government as the owner of the project has more authority in the partnership, thus considered as a justification for being superior towards the other stakeholders.

Additionally, the general approach in dealing with the consequences of the risks that occur in projects developed under this system is through problem solving rather than prevention. As a result, the private sector has no choice but to accept these consequences for most of the times even though it does not have the required resources and experience to manage the unanticipated losses. When such situation continues, the possibility of projects experiencing further problems in the future will be greater - making it even more difficult to achieve success, both in the short-term and the long-term. Unfortunately, the majority of stakeholders do not realize that projects developed under this system would have to deal with short-term issues as well as long-term issues.

Mr. Abednego’s research provides an alternative point of view in observing PPP projects by pointing out that these projects are not only confronted with project management problems but also they have project governance concerns. Good Project Governance concept was developed in an effort to ensure the achievement of long-term project success. It has the characteristics of: 1) Making the right decision at the right time; 2) Ensuring contract fairness; 3) Information transparency; 4) Responsiveness; 5) Continuous project control and monitoring; 6) Equality; 7) Effectiveness and efficiency and 8) Accountability (Abednego & Ogunlana, 2006). Four core principles of GPG were established from this to help assess the relationship between risk allocation and project success in each of the case studies. These core principles are fairness, transparency, accountability and sustainability. Each of these principles was further devolved into subcomponents and each subcomponent into key analytical issues, which are then used to assess whether or not risks have been properly allocated and to judge how it affects project success.

Mr. Abednego has several significant conclusions made from his research and each of them is briefly described in the following sections.

1. Perceptions on risk and its allocation - The result of the analysis shows that the government has a clearly different perception compared to the private sector with regards to what is considered as potential risk. In all of the case studies, the governments tend to be more concerned about the problems that may occur during the construction stage of the project. On the other hand, the private sectors are more concerned about the lack of commitment and support from the government that shows in the existing regulations, laws and policies that tend to be discriminatory and insufficient in providing the necessary protection for private investments. This shows that the private sector is more concerned about the source of the problem rather than the actual problem itself because of the belief that problems can be prevented if necessary improvements are made towards the source. Although the private sector is more than willing to be responsible for the consequences of decisions and actions, however, they also expect the government to accept its own share of responsibilities, starting by honoring agreements and providing the necessary guarantees for the private sector, this condition most of the time if they want to be involved in such projects. This puts them in an inferior position relative to the government and eventually prevents project risks from being allocated properly.

2. Perceptions on project success - the following are the significant success factors that were identified from the case studies:
􀀁 Ability to carry out negotiations
􀀁 Accurate estimation (traffic demand & construction cost)
􀀁 Advance risk management system
􀀁 Availability of the required resources
􀀁 Communication method
􀀁 Compliance on agreement/contract
􀀁 Continuous project monitoring and control
􀀁 Attractive investment environment/condition
􀀁 Non-discriminative and non-ambiguous agreement/contract
􀀁 Effective project management
􀀁 Equality of rights and responsibilities among stakeholders
􀀁 Experience
􀀁 Fair compensation policy
􀀁 Fair tendering process
􀀁 Financial achievement
􀀁 Functionality
􀀁 Good contractor/concessionaire selection system
􀀁 Good coordination
􀀁 Good managerial capabilities
􀀁 Government guarantee
􀀁 Government support
􀀁 Improved laws/regulations related to PPP procurement system
􀀁 Information dissemination
􀀁 Market/demand oriented
􀀁 Minimize government interference
􀀁 Minimize land acquisition problem
􀀁 Less political pressure
􀀁 On-time project completion
􀀁 Professionalism
􀀁 Project quality achievement
􀀁 Proper infrastructure development planning
􀀁 Proper project financing strategy
􀀁 Public participation
􀀁 Reasonable payback structure
􀀁 Sufficient time to complete project engineering design
􀀁 Trust

There is a lack of knowledge with respect to the unique characteristics of projects that are developed under the PPP scheme. Most stakeholders do not realize that this kind of projects have governance concerns in addition to management concerns. Consequently, PPP projects are still managed like regular construction projects that are considered to be successful as long as they manage to deal with the short-term issues. Unfortunately, without acknowledging and understanding the importance of addressing the long-term issues, the overall success of PPP projects will be affected.

3. Assessment based on the fairness principle - The main issue discovered from the case studies that prevent the risks to be allocated properly and creating unfair conditions is government’s unwillingness to provide the necessary support and guarantees that would protect private sector investments. This condition is worsened by the ambiguity in the agreements between the government and private sector, and also by the constant interference by the government during the whole course of the project. As a result, the private sector was not able to properly identify the project risks, causing them to involuntarily assume the consequences that were not actually theirs. This would negatively affect the private sector’s revenue in the long run and eventually jeopardize the overall success of projects.

4. Assessment based on the transparency principle - Information dissemination is often a problem in PPP projects. Instead of being shared, it is often obscured; resulting in misperception and misinformation in the project. Unfortunately, this condition is often exploited by the government for fear that the information may be used by the private sector to make claims. Adding to the fact that the existing information management system is insufficient and still requires further improvements, these circumstances prevented the private sector from developing accurate plans and make better preparations. In addition, the government had not also been able or willing to make reasonable adjustments on the project’s financing strategy as previously agreed. Due to this lack of information and financial transparency, conflicts and disputes are inevitable, causing additional problems.

5. Assessment based on the accountability principle

The government and the private sector often overlooked the end-users of the infrastructure as well as its surrounding communities in the process of developing projects. Aside from the Don Muang Tollway project, the projects in Indonesia and Vietnam did not involve any public hearings. As such, the people were given no chance to raise their concerns or even offer suggestions for the project, which prevented them from participating and contributing directly to the project. Regarding the quality issue, most stakeholders refer to it in terms of the physical condition of the infrastructure whereas it should also include the management value and this, unfortunately, is the real situation. Unless the public is given more opportunity to be involved in the development process of projects and quality, both physical and managerial, is improved, the government is (here considered to be) accountable for the negative consequences that it may cause.

6. Assessment based on the sustainability principle

Lack of coordination between government agencies and also between the government and the private sector has prevented the stakeholders of PPP projects from sustaining their partnership in the long run. Consequently, this would affect project performance. For example, lack of coordination would result in inappropriate information dissemination creating difficulties to produce accurate estimation in terms of project cost. The latter situation would then further affect the development of a suitable project financing strategy and payback structure. Ultimately, disputes are inevitable and the sustainability of the project is vulnerable.

7. Overall achievement in terms of Good Project Governance

Based on the assessments that have been made using the four core principles of GPG, the risks in the three case studies were still allocated improperly. This condition influenced the performance of the projects, not only during the initiation and construction stages but also for throughout whole concession period. Consequently, it prevented the projects from achieving overall success. Therefore, these projects cannot be considered to have good project governance because they failed to deal with most of the issues that have long-term implications on the projects, which are mainly caused by improper risk allocation.

His thesis abstract is copied and posted.

Abstract
Studies have shown that there are increasing trends of using Public-Private Partnership (PPP) procurement system in developing countries, including the Southeast Asia countries. In addition to this, the concept of good governance is also becoming a more perceived issue, especially in state-owned enterprises. With such development in the construction industry, it is important to understand what would be the best approach to govern (manage) a construction project, especially public infrastructure projects under PPP procurement system such as tollway projects, so that it may increase the project’s level of success.

Proper risk allocation is considered as one of the critical success factors to enhance the performance of PPP projects. However, parties that are involved in a PPP project typically have different perception of risks, risk allocation strategy as well as project success. Moreover, PPP projects are generally challenged with both project management problems, which require day-to-day supervision (short-term) as well as partnership problems that require more of a strategic approach (long-term). Due to this unique condition, PPP projects can be considered to have governance concerns in addition to management concerns because it deals with monitoring and overseeing strategic direction as well as strategic decision-making (Mueller, 1981).

This research is conducted to examine the influence of risk allocation towards project success. Since proper risk allocation is considered to be an essential part for attaining good project governance, therefore, it is assumed that the performance level of a project would increase due to the proper allocation thus generating a successful project. A good project governance concept was developed as a result of this research. Its four core principles, fairness, transparency, accountability and sustainability is used to assess the influence of the risk allocation arrangements that were applied towards the project success, especially in the long-term. Three tollway projects from Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam were selected as case studies for this research. The research discovered that the government clearly has a different perception of risk and proper risk allocation compared to the private sector. However, these two stakeholders still lack the knowledge to the unique characteristics of PPP projects and fail to recognize the fact that this kind of projects has governance concerns in addition to management concerns. As a result of their short-term oriented point of view, the project’s long-term issues were often overlooked, affecting its overall success.