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Public-private partnerships (PPPs) offer governments an opportunity to access private capital and skills to build or upgrade, operate and manage public water infrastructure services hitherto provided and run by the public sector. Access to private finance speeds up the provision of public water services in developing countries, where many governments face budgetary constraints. However, the water sector attracts the least investment flows in developing countries, well below other infrastructure sectors. This paper aims to present the results of an investigation of critical success factors (CSFs) required for attracting the private sector in water supply projects.

A structured questionnaire survey of international PPP expert opinions was conducted.

Analysis results show that the CSFs for attracting the private sector to water PPPs include political commitment from elected leaders toward PPPs for water supply; existence of a dedicated PPP unit; strong and competent public water authority; adequate fiscal capacity of a national/subnational authority; public acceptance and support of involvement of the private sector in water services; a well-designed PPP contract; existence of enabling policy and legal frameworks to support water PPPs; and profitability of water supply project(s) to attract investors and lenders. Agreement analysis also indicates a strong to very strong agreement on the significance and rankings of the CSFs.

The research findings provide an insight into a number of important issues to enable greater private participation in water supply projects, most of which aim at reminding governments of some key areas that need reform and enabling greater commitment among them to undertake such reforms. Given the limited empirical research on CSFs for attracting private participation, this research makes a contribution to the body of knowledge about private involvement in the water sector of developing countries.

The purpose of this paper is to identify and assess the perceptions of stakeholders on critical success factors (CSFs) for Public Private Partnership (PPP) projects in Nigeria.

A comprehensive literature review was conducted to identify the CSFs for PPP projects, which were employed to design a questionnaire survey. In order to capture a broad perception of stakeholders, the questionnaires were administered to five different stakeholder organisations involved in different PPP projects implementation in Nigeria. Data collected were analysed using descriptive statistics, mean score, Kruskal-Wallis test, analysis of variance (ANOVA), and factor analysis.

The study revealed the result of mean score ranking, which indicated that all the stakeholders considered the identified 26 CSFs important and crucial for the successful implementation of PPP projects in Nigeria. Thus, the results of Kruskal-Wallis test and ANOVA indicated that except for six (out of 26) identified CSFs, there is no statistically significant difference in the perceptions of the stakeholders on CSFs for PPP projects in Nigeria. The study, through factor analysis, grouped the 26 identified CSFs into six principal factors.

This research would be of benefit to stakeholders in PPPs to be aware of CSFs that demand utmost consideration. Also the identified CSFs are expected to enhance the success rate of PPP projects.

The findings would be useful for PPP stakeholders in making decisions and in implementing PPP projects towards achieving value for money. This research will also be of interest to other academic researchers intending to investigate CSFs for PPP projects in other locations.

The purpose of this paper is to focus on the challenges faced by the public and private sectors in developing output specifications for Australian public private partnership (PPP) projects. In particular, this study aims to examine how the stakeholders (including facilities managers) should cater for future changes in output specifications and make them flexible enough to meet the evolving project objectives.

The research is based on 19 semi‐structured interviews with key stakeholders from the public and private sectors in three States of Australia where PPP procurement has been used, including New South Wales (NSW), Queensland and Victoria. The results are triangulated with relevant literature for supports and contrasts.

For PPP projects, a good set of output specifications is conducive to the achievement of value for money, innovation, risk transfer, whole life asset performance through a clear abatement regime and an effective linkage of performance criteria to the payment mechanism. For existing specifications, it was found that too many and complex KPIs were specified, which were difficult to monitor, measure and implement by the client. Very prescriptive specifications hindered innovations and did not allow appropriate risk allocation. Further, the research study suggests that after the global financial crises, the private sector had less appetite to take the patronage risks in road and rail PPP projects. To mitigate these pitfalls, it is imperative that output specifications need to be aligned with the type of PPP projects they represent; in particular foreseeable changes should be addressed by some pre‐agreed framework to facilitate negotiation.

The significant contribution of this research is the identification of the common issues faced in drafting output specifications for Australian PPP projects. Stakeholders of future PPP projects should find the lessons useful for achieving value for money and appropriate risk transfer, stating the user requirements through clear and concise output specifications rather than input or prescriptive specifications in procuring social and economical PPP projects. Their relationships with facilities management are highlighted.

Owing to increasing demands for new infrastructure and a reduction in public sector investment, Australian governments are increasingly turning to the private sector to form partnerships in the design, construction, ownership and operation of public sector projects. This paper aims to focus on the use of public‐private partnerships (PPPs) to procure “social infrastructure projects”, such as schools, hospitals and prisons. The research seeks to map the current extent of PPPs and to present some preliminary findings on the cost of bidding.

The research traces the origins of social infrastructure PPPs in Australia and gives an up‐to‐date account by mapping projects that are either completed to date or in the pipeline. The research also describes preliminary findings on additional costs likely to be incurred in bidding for social infrastructure PPPs. A semi‐structured interview process involving senior managers from private sector PPP stakeholders was used in conjunction with a review of project documentation.

Social infrastructure projects are characterised as generally being smaller in scale than economic infrastructure projects (motorways, bridges, tunnels, etc.) and, by their very nature, also tend to be complex, particularly in terms of ongoing involvement with the community. Thus, private‐sector bidders for social infrastructure PPP projects are often presented with a situation where the financial rewards are less and the operational demands are more complex than for hard economic PPP projects. The private sector would welcome increased risk transfer from the public sector and subsequently greater involvement in the operational stages of social infrastructure PPPs.

The outcome of the research project is of assistance to decision takers in both the public and private sectors by making explicit factors which are currently accepted as being implicit in PPP bidding and project evaluation. Ongoing research into PPPs is vital to ensure the development of sustainable procurements methods, the continued funding of a nation's infrastructure, successful operational viability, fair risk distribution and subsequent financial success and that greater rewards are provided for all stakeholders, particularly the community at large.

There has been a significant increase in the use of relationship contracting in the global construction industry, with strategies such as Partnering, Alliancing and Public-Private Partnerships all used. These approaches were introduced to the Australian construction industry in the 1990s in an attempt to overcome the adversarial nature of traditional contracting methods. The purpose of this paper is to investigate factors that influence the successful implementation of Project Alliancing by means of a case study approach focusing on the procurement of a large water treatment plant. The research findings identify critical success factors (CSFs) both from literature and the case study project.

The research traces the origins of Alliancing and identifies CSFs by reviewing literature and analysing a current case study project. The paper first identifies CSFs on a global scale by establishing a theoretical framework of CSFs and then compares this to the case study project. A case study of an Australian Alliance project is investigated whereby a semi-structured interview process, involving senior managers from the six partners from the Alliance, was used in conjunction with a review of project documentation. The findings of the case study project are compared to the literature and any new CSFs are identified.

Alliancing helps to establish and manage the relationships between all parties, remove barriers and encourage maximum contribution to achieve success. Alliancing provides a project delivery method that promotes open communication, equality and a systematic problem resolution process. Team culture focusing on an “open book/no blame” approach is vital to the success of an Alliance. Five CSFs were identified as specifically influencing the success of the case study project: the use of an integrated Alliance office; the staging of project and stretch targets; establishing project specific key performance indicators; facilitating on-going workshops; and the integration of a web-based management programme.

The research findings assist both public and private sectors by identifying factors that are critical for success in Alliancing. Five additional factors were identified as specifically influencing the success of the case study project. Since this research was conducted, Australia has seen a further increase in relationship contracting where the likes of Alliancing is often used as the default approach for certain Public Sector projects. Ongoing research into Alliancing is vital to ensure the development of sustainable procurement models, successful operational viability, fair risk distribution and value for money.

Governments throughout the world are being forced to review how to fund the increasing demand and rising expectations of their citizens. This is especially relevant for developing countries, which often have limited capital resources to meet the soaring needs for essential infrastructure. This has consequently led to increased involvement of the private sector in the provision of public services, using various forms of Public‐Private Partnerships (PPPs). It is, however, important for both the public and private sectors to understand the various risks associated with PPPs throughout the whole life cycle of the projects in order to guarantee long‐term success. This is especially true in Nigeria and other countries where the use of PPPs are still in the early stages of development. Sixty‐one PPP risk factors were identified from literature and classified into exogenous and endogenous risks. This paper presents the results of the questionnaire survey that investigated the perception of Nigerian construction professionals on the relative importance of the identified risks and their preferences of allocation between the public and private sectors. The results show that the three most important PPP risk factors in Nigeria are “unstable government”, “inadequate experience in PPP” and “availability of finnance”. The respondents’ risk allocation preferences show that while most of the endogenous risk factors could be assigned to the private sector partner, the public sector should retain political and site acquisition risks, while relation‐ship‐based risks should be shared between the private and public sector partners

The provision of school assets and associated services is essential for achieving a country's educational outcomes. Building and managing schools usually features large component of operation, multiple groups of stakeholders, relatively simple design and technical requirements and tight timeframes to be completed to meet the open date. Internationally, public-private partnerships (PPPs) were introduced as innovative delivery models to bring forward school projects. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the PPP experiences in the school sector focusing on the critical dimensions impacting on the viability of using PPPs for school development.

Comparative case studies of two school PPP projects based in Australia and New Zealand were adopted as the main research method. Semi-structured interviews with key stakeholders were used as primary data collection method.

By examining the procedural and organisational arrangements from a comparative perspective, the research finds that, for a successful school PPP, the followings are critical: sound business case development; size-adjusted and streamlined tendering process; localised private sector partner and streamlined finance; extensive stakeholder engagement; and effective governance and organisational structure and enhanced partnership.

The findings provide practical implications for policy makers and public procuring authorities initiating school projects and private entities seeking investment opportunities. By implementing the strategies derived from this research and adjusting to their own social and economic environment, governments and industry would be at a better position to develop and manage schools using PPPs.

The purpose of this paper is twofold: first, to identify and rank the challenges influencing the delivery of the housing public-private partnership (HPPP) in Tanzania; and second, to suggest solutions in the form of a conceptual public-private partnership (PPP) framework model that will address the identified challenges and boost the chances of success.

Using a convergent parallel (concurrent) mixed method approach, data were collected from 28 stakeholders involved with HPPP projects in Tanzania using a hand-delivered and e-mail survey and 13 semi-structured interviews with public and private sector respondents. The quantitative data included subjecting the 19 challenges as identified from the literature to parametric tests such as one-sample t-tests and descriptive statistics tests such as measures of central tendencies and frequency analysis through Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS 22.0). Qualitative data employed content analysis. The research was further underpinned by a number of theoretical perspectives such as Gidden’s structuration theory, contingency theory, relational and equity theory.

The top five ranked challenges influencing the delivery of HPPP were “inadequate PPP skills and knowledge”; “poor contracting and tendering documents”; “inadequate project management”; “inadequate legal framework”; and “misinformation on financial capacity of private partners”. The least six ranked and most significant challenges based on the one-sample (single) t-tests were as follows: “Poor risk allocation”; “inexperienced private partner”; “unequal qualification and contributions of expertise”; “poor enabling environment to attract competent partners”; “inadequate mechanisms for recovery of private investors’ capital”; and “high costs in procuring PPP projects”. The qualitative study further confirmed the challenges and cited the reason for the failure of joint venture projects as the lack of motivation for undertaking similar PPP projects. Despite the increased awareness of PPP projects and associated marginal benefits, the main impediment to the uptake and delivery of PPP housing projects remained the lack of skills and expertise.

The proposed framework model is not yet tested, but since this paper is part of the ongoing research, the next stage involves the testing and validation of the model. Future studies could test the applicability of the proposed framework in other HPPP projects in Tanzania, and in other similar developing countries. Second, the validated framework can contribute towards addressing similar challenges as well as providing guidance. The proposed framework model is not yet tested, but since this paper is part of the ongoing research, the next stage involves the testing and validation of the model. Furthermore, recommendation for future research is to test the alignment of the identified challenges to the proposed remedial solutions across the five phases within the proposed PPP framework with a number of case studies.

The identified challenges were used to form the basis of the framework presented in this paper. Furthermore, these provide useful information, thus leading to increased awareness to enable successful delivery of HPPP in Tanzania. Similarly, both the government and policy makers could use the findings as the basis for re-examining the existing PPP policy and regulations, and reflecting on the existing situation with a view to improving the delivery of future HPPP projects.

The empirical study is among the first that identifies and ranks the challenges of PPP for housing projects delivery within the Tanzanian context. The identification of the challenges enabled their ranking, resulting in the mapping out of the most critical challenges. Furthermore, using the Gidden’s structuration theory, the study illustrates how institution mechanisms (structures) address these delivery challenges, thus influencing the implementation of HPPP in Tanzania, and how individual stakeholders (human agents or agency) are able to make choices (advocated solutions) in dealing with the challenges. More so, these constraints (challenges) as identified and viewed through the contingency and equity theoretical lenses form the foundation for developing the PPP conceptual framework. The proposed framework would thus serve as a mechanism for providing practical solutions as well as reducing the level of severity of the identified challenges.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a critical assessment of legal and regulatory impediments to effective governance of public-private partnerships (PPPs) in Kazakhstan.

The qualitative study develops propositions from the PPP literature and then tests them against findings from in-depth interviews. Interviewees have been selected by a purposeful sampling from PPP projects in Kazakhstan as well as from national and regional PPP centres.

The identified barriers to effective PPP management include irregularities in the PPP legal framework, such as lack of legal definition of a PPP and controversy with the government guarantee’s legal status for its long-term payments to partnerships; bureaucratic tariff setting for partnership services; non-existent opportunity for private asset ownership; and excessive government regulation of PPP workers’ wage rates.

The partners’ opposing perspectives on a number of PPP issues show that management needs to identify and carefully reconcile stakeholder values in a partnership in order to achieve more effective PPP governance. Practitioners, particularly those in the public agencies, have to be concerned with ways to reduce the government overregulation of the private operators, which is likely to result in greater PPP flexibility in management and, ultimately, higher efficiency in delivering the public services.

By elucidating multiple examples of overregulation and PPPs’ inefficiency, the paper demonstrates that the government dominance in PPP management is conceptually inappropriate. Instead, the government should adopt the concept of co-production and manage its relations with the private sector partner in a collaborative fashion.

The purpose of this paper is to identify the critical success factors (CSFs) and key areas for improvement for public–private partnerships (PPP) in affordable housing schemes (AHS) projects, using Tanzania as a case study.

Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 10 public and private sector practitioners in Tanzania. The collected data and the interview transcripts were analysed using the standard qualitative analysis technique of content analysis.

The findings show the six most important CSFs as: a dedicated team of professionals to oversee the PPP projects, official and unofficial site visits and inspection, government support and guarantees, undertaking checks and balance from the design stage to construction stage, scrutiny of PPP project proposal and trust and integrity. The mapping of the CSFs across the PPP project lifecycle highlighted a higher incidence across the following phases: building (n = 11), preparation (n = 10) and operational (n = 9).

The identification of these CSFs would support PPP practitioners in successfully implementing PPP in AHS; besides, there is potential for their inclusion in the future development of the affordable housing PPP conceptual framework. Therefore, based on the identified CSFs, both the government and policy makers could use the findings as the basis for re-examining the existing PPP policy and regulations and reflecting on the existing situation with a view to improving the delivery of future PPP projects.

This paper provides the first empirical study by applying direct content analysis to identify and understand the CSFs and key areas for improvement for PPPs in AHS within the Tanzanian housing sector. This is rather an under researched subject around CSFs for PPPs from developing countries such as Tanzania.