Implementing Value Engineering on Road Projects in Ghana

The inadequate and unsatisfactory Value for Money (VFM) achieved on road projects in developing countries like Ghana has been so pervasive and still remains an inevitable issue and a canker. Road Infrastructure and Support Agencies (RISA) under the Ministry of Roads and Highways (MRH) with its experienced and astute Road Professionals (RPs) or Technical Professionals (TPs) still continue to be confronted with VFM issues even though almost all road projects in Ghana are believed to have a VFM agenda. The capital intensive nature of road projects in developing countries, like Ghana coupled with its inevitable myriad of challenges still poses so much threats to road project administration in the country both now and even in the future. The attempt to achieve an optimum VFM through an advanced VFM practice integration into the conventional VFM practice remains the only solution to remedying these problems or challenges that have bedeviled this unrealized VFM agenda. Accordingly, the study was conducted with the aim of establishing the usefulness of Value Engineering (VE) on road projects in Ghana to promote its implementation. A quantitative survey research design was adopted and consequently, a closed-ended questionnaire was employed in eliciting responses from respondents in the Road Infrastructure and Support Agencies (RISA) under the Ministry of Roads and Highways (MRH) in Koforidua, Eastern region. Data were, thus, subjected to statistical analysis tests using descriptive (exploratory) and inferential (hypothetical or bivariate) tests. Inferential tests included parametric tests (Pearson Correlation tests and Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) tests) adopted for the Continuous data and the non-parametric tests (Binomial and Chi-square tests) employed for the Nominal data. Based on the overall statistical tests, it was revealed that Value Engineering (VE) Integration into each of the nine (9) knowledge areas of Project Management (PM) was of significance and high value with mean score responses greater than 3.5 and significance values greater than 0.05. Throughout the study it was as well revealed that Value Engineering (VE) technique was as powerful a tool to be implemented on road projects in Ghana since respondents were very much convinced about the effectiveness of this practice for an optimum VFM on road projects in Ghana since the conventional VFM practice was seen to be deficient in its attempt to accomplish an optimum VFM agenda. This study is, thus, geared towards promoting the implementation of an optimum VFM agenda on road projects in Ghana to enhance the existing Road Project Management (RPM) practices and Road Professionals (RPs) expertise. It is, therefore, recommended that all Road Professionals (RPs) within the Road Infrastructure and Support Agencies (RISA) under the Ministry of Roads and Highways (MRH) are given an intensive training on ‘Value Engineering (VE) Integration into Road Project Management (RPM)’ by way of a Value Engineering (VE) Highway Model and accordingly, ‘Value Engineering (VE) Control Clauses’ integrated into road contract documents. The study explores a relatively new area and consequently serves as the basis to spur future research.

Source: KNUST