Constraints in the Implementation of Public Private Partnerships in Afghanistan

Traditional procurement methods have repeatedly failed to deliver projects on time and to budget in Afghanistan, and there are serious concerns about quality, cost, time and sustainability. The Afghan government has no choice but to partner with the private sector in order to meet the increasing demands on delivery of public projects. Therefore, Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) has been considered as an alternative to traditional procurement methods. The rationale is that there are no PPPs without constraints but people, even in the most insecure environments, respond to economic incentives in a rational way. This research sets out to identify the key constraints that affect the implementation of PPPs in Afghanistan. A critical review of the literature was conducted to evaluate the nature and structure of PPPs and key implementation issues, constraints influencing the implementation of PPPs and Afghanistan political, economic and social environment. 23 constraints were extracted from literature review and included into a questionnaire. The questionnaire was sent to stakeholders involved in developing infrastructure projects in Afghanistan in order to assess the degree of influence of constraints on PPPs. To establish the rating effect of constraints, the importance index was deployed. The result indicates that Afghanistan is facing with greater challenges in provision of infrastructure projects and services of which security, corruption, lack of capacity coupled with lack of funding are just to name a few. Based upon these findings, the paper recommends action on key drivers for enabling PPPs in Afghanistan.