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The South African building procurement strategy for public sector delivery in the Civil Engineering industry: investigating alternatives

Reports from members of the civil engineering industry in South Africa claim that the industry is struggling and that there is a drain of technical expertise from the country. Some role players blame the cost-based competitive building procurement strategy currently widely used by the public sector,...

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Main Author: Visser, Zwingli
Other Authors: Massyn, Mark
Format: Thesis
Language:English
Published: Department of Construction Economics and Management 2020
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access_status_str Open Access
author Visser, Zwingli
author2 Massyn, Mark
author_browse Massyn, Mark
Visser, Zwingli
author_facet Massyn, Mark
Visser, Zwingli
author_sort Visser, Zwingli
collection Thesis
description Reports from members of the civil engineering industry in South Africa claim that the industry is struggling and that there is a drain of technical expertise from the country. Some role players blame the cost-based competitive building procurement strategy currently widely used by the public sector, while others believe the Traditional Building Procurement Strategy is to blame. This study investigates circumstances surrounding the current South African building procurement strategy to establish if there are problems with the current system, identify what those problems are and investigates what alternatives can be implemented to positively affect project delivery. A single Case study is used to interview fifteen respondents in the civil engineering industry. Interviews with municipal officials, consultants and contractors are held and the results of the interviews are analyzed. The results of the study indicate that a cost-based building procurement strategy is leading to poor project delivery and client dissatisfaction as too much focus is put on pricing and preference criteria instead of quality criteria. Contributing to the dire situation are consultants having to tender at excessive discounts to ensure the procurement of services. This also leads to a drain of technical skills in South Africa and a lack of technical capacity in Local Government to provide the necessary input during project execution. Few of the respondents have been involved in any alternative building procurement strategies. The interpretation of legislation by the municipal officials during the tender evaluation process seems to add to project delays and over-expenditure on projects and many of the respondents believe that the current strategy was developed specifically to curb corruption and therefore change is not imminent. The study concludes that the industry’s representative bodies needs play a bigger role in informing National Government of the current problems associated with public-sector delivery in order to effect policy changes. Only then it can be implemented at Local Government level to ensure an improvement in public-sector delivery.
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institution University of Cape Town (South Africa)
language eng
last_indexed 2026-06-10T12:32:27.580Z
license_str Not specified — see source repository
provenance_str_mv Harvested via OAI-PMH from UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository
publishDate 2020
publishDateRange 2020
publishDateSort 2020
publisher Department of Construction Economics and Management
publisherStr Department of Construction Economics and Management
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spelling oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/31779 The South African building procurement strategy for public sector delivery in the Civil Engineering industry: investigating alternatives Visser, Zwingli Massyn, Mark Project Management Reports from members of the civil engineering industry in South Africa claim that the industry is struggling and that there is a drain of technical expertise from the country. Some role players blame the cost-based competitive building procurement strategy currently widely used by the public sector, while others believe the Traditional Building Procurement Strategy is to blame. This study investigates circumstances surrounding the current South African building procurement strategy to establish if there are problems with the current system, identify what those problems are and investigates what alternatives can be implemented to positively affect project delivery. A single Case study is used to interview fifteen respondents in the civil engineering industry. Interviews with municipal officials, consultants and contractors are held and the results of the interviews are analyzed. The results of the study indicate that a cost-based building procurement strategy is leading to poor project delivery and client dissatisfaction as too much focus is put on pricing and preference criteria instead of quality criteria. Contributing to the dire situation are consultants having to tender at excessive discounts to ensure the procurement of services. This also leads to a drain of technical skills in South Africa and a lack of technical capacity in Local Government to provide the necessary input during project execution. Few of the respondents have been involved in any alternative building procurement strategies. The interpretation of legislation by the municipal officials during the tender evaluation process seems to add to project delays and over-expenditure on projects and many of the respondents believe that the current strategy was developed specifically to curb corruption and therefore change is not imminent. The study concludes that the industry’s representative bodies needs play a bigger role in informing National Government of the current problems associated with public-sector delivery in order to effect policy changes. Only then it can be implemented at Local Government level to ensure an improvement in public-sector delivery. 2020-05-06T02:10:58Z 2020-05-06T02:10:58Z 2019 2020-05-06T01:49:26Z Master Thesis Masters MSc https://hdl.handle.net/11427/31779 eng application/pdf Department of Construction Economics and Management Faculty of Engineering and the Built Environment
spellingShingle Project Management
Visser, Zwingli
The South African building procurement strategy for public sector delivery in the Civil Engineering industry: investigating alternatives
thesis_degree_str Master's
title The South African building procurement strategy for public sector delivery in the Civil Engineering industry: investigating alternatives
title_full The South African building procurement strategy for public sector delivery in the Civil Engineering industry: investigating alternatives
title_fullStr The South African building procurement strategy for public sector delivery in the Civil Engineering industry: investigating alternatives
title_full_unstemmed The South African building procurement strategy for public sector delivery in the Civil Engineering industry: investigating alternatives
title_short The South African building procurement strategy for public sector delivery in the Civil Engineering industry: investigating alternatives
title_sort south african building procurement strategy for public sector delivery in the civil engineering industry investigating alternatives
topic Project Management
url https://hdl.handle.net/11427/31779
work_keys_str_mv AT visserzwingli thesouthafricanbuildingprocurementstrategyforpublicsectordeliveryinthecivilengineeringindustryinvestigatingalternatives
AT visserzwingli southafricanbuildingprocurementstrategyforpublicsectordeliveryinthecivilengineeringindustryinvestigatingalternatives