Stakeholders have called on government and policymakers to make effective project management an intrinsic part of policy and programme formulation, as this is critical to national development.
According to the stakeholders, effective project management is a panacea to the intractable problem of abandoned projects in the country, as the practice provides the yardsticks for proper implementation of development projects that have value addition on the citizenry.
The stakeholders made their views known Tuesday at the 2019/10th-anniversary edition of the National Project Management Conference (ProMacon) in Abuja.
In his presentation, director-general, National Bureau of Statistics, Yemi Kale, who said project management was critical national development, observed that there were areas that Nigeria has done well in the area of project implementation but the country has failed in other areas.
Kale noted that one of the major reasons why Nigeria had not achieved national development is because project management has not been given its rightful place in terms of planning and implementation of policies.
He said, “we are not where we should be today because of poor project management process. We have thousands of abandoned projects all over the country and is likely a result of poor project management.
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Also the managing director of Nigerian Incentive-Based Risk Sharing System for Agriculture Learning (NIRSAL) said in order to address major national developmental challenges, Nigeria needs to adopt and adapt project management principles to drive development and reduce focus on monitoring and evaluation, poorly tailored programmes, frequent cost over-runs and frequent time over-runs.
Represented by Bayo Oladoja, Aliyu lamented that ineffective project management is a key constraint in the achievement of Agribusiness and National development initiatives in Nigeria, hence the need for its adoption.
He noted NIRSAL utilised effective project management to provide sustainable value for the agricultural sector through project identification, definition, planning, execution, monitoring and control, transition planning/ early life support.
“Project management performance factors such as cost, timescales, quality, scope, benefits and risk are critical to the successful delivery of agriculture and agribusiness projects.
“Benefits of adopting effective project management to agriculture and agribusiness are increasing productivity, reduce material and labour cost, minimize material waste, enhance cash flow and profit, identify opportunities and eliminate problems, improve communication between agricultural/agribusiness teams and reduce waste and accuracy in harvesting processes,” Aliyu added.
In his remarks, programme director, ProMacon, Taopheek Babayeju stated there was an intricate linkage between development and project management as it is that indispensable tool that the developed nations and successful organisations have used to achieve developmental and business results.
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He said studies have shown that organisations that have Project Management in driving their initiatives have succeeded more, hence many organisations both in the public and private sector, local and international now set up Project Management Offices (PMOs) to support their Strategy Units.
“However, is important to note that project management is not about construction, nor it, it is also not just a practice, it is a way of life, it is both science and art of execution which helps to close the gap between strategy and result, between budget and delivery, between aspirations and development.
“ProMaCon has over the years engaged stakeholders from Presidency to legislature, while hosting several of them as guests, featured 32 keynote and technical speakers from all over the world (Africa, US and UK) hosted about 3,000 local and international delegates, who remain actively in our network.
“ProMaCon is not an association but a social enterprise and a platform designed with every practitioners and professionals in mind, irrespective of their body of knowledge, methodology and affiliation, be it PMI, Prince2, IPMA or local associations and institutes. ProMaCon is dedicated to the growth of the project management in Africa through capacity development, stakeholders engagement research & development, and practice development,” Babayeju said.
