CONSTRUCTION COST SYSTEM IN CHINA

Abstract

The construction industry in Singapore is entering into a booming period, due to the limitation of both material resources and man power, one of the few choices left to Singapore construction firms is to explore the overseas market. As one of the most dynamic construction markets in the world, China is identified as a potential base for Singapore’s investors. However, minimal knowledge related to local construction climate and practices often make foreign contractors and developers to suffer high investment loss when their development is fully constructed and handed over. The aim of this study is to evaluate the cost system in China, and to identify solutions to problem encountered, meantime, to help Singapore firms better understand the Chinese construction market. The research design was based on survey questionnaire and personal interviews. The data collected from survey questions was examined by using contingency tables and independent sample t-test, in order to find out correlation among variables. The interviews’ opinion was evaluated also. The main findings of this study indicate that there are too many defects in the SSRC system as it fails to adapt to the rapid development in China’s construction industry. Therefore, a transformation process for changing the SSRC system to the BQ system is necessary, and is beneficial to the construction industry in China. Limitations in this study include small sample size of survey and interview conducted and much of the materials and references used for this study are written in Chinese, which are difficult to interpret.