Implementation Challenges and Handling Project Management Complexities in China-Pakistan Economic Corridor

Abstract

China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) is a component of One Belt-One Road (OBOR) initiative of Chinese government to connect the globe with rail, road and sea links. CPEC comprises 968 KM road, 1830 KM Rail Link, energy, infrastructure, special economic zones, industrial parks, mass transit, and social sector development projects stretching from Pak-China boarder to Pakistan's port city of Gwadar. The US$ 64 billion program is under active implementation. The goal of our research was to identify key program implementation challenges and identification of resolution strategies while executing projects in CPEC portfolio. We used expert purposive sampling because our research required fetching firsthand knowledge from the key personnel at various Government institutions who have been involved in planning and implementation of these projects. We identified authorities who are part of the Joint Cooperation Committees involved in execution, problem solving and decision making process, and their assignments covered relevant portfolios. The identified challenges/barriers were classified into financial, technical, political, social equity and human resource categories and used in personal and/or Skype interviews. The challenge/barrier classes passed content and response validity tests. The identified challenges that fall in high probability-impact grid area are political instability, cultural impact (the nature of the initiative is transnational), delays in starting the projects, agreement on equitable sharing, and security to social values of people in the cultural context. From the economic perspective, private-public partnerships should be evolved with clear agreements and the need is to grow our economy in the form of exports. CPEC is not only a transport or logistics corridor but an economic corridor having industrial zones, quality with safety to societal factors and the uplift to the standard of life style of the people. The NVivo Plus and SPSS were used for data analysis. The research outcomes are applicable to manage technology infrastructure projects in other developing countries as well.