Attractive Factors of Public Private Partnership (PPP) for Road Projects in Ethiopia

The private sector has long been involved in delivering public sector projects in Ethiopia but its role limited as consultant and contractor for the government. Over recent years, the interest in adopting Public Private Partnership (PPP) has increased internationally. Many research outcomes have presented positive reasons for the governments and the private sector to welcome this form of long term contract arrangement, rather than continue involving in the traditional procurement methods. This paper aims to explore the attractive factors for PPP implementation in the Ethiopian road sector. A questionnaire survey was conducted in Ethiopia and survey respondents were invited to rate their perceptions on the importance of seventeen different attractive factors identified. The results show that the five important attractive factors for pursuing PPP in the Ethiopian road sector are: ‘solve the problem of public sector budget restraint’, ‘facilitate creative and innovative approaches’, ‘save time in delivering the project’, ‘improve maintainability’ and ‘enhance government integrated solution capacity’. The research outputs contribute to the limited knowledge on PPP practices in Ethiopia by providing empirical evidence on the conditions that are attractive to the introduction of PPP in the road sector.