Determine the Most Important Construction Risks and Know the Degree of Their Impact on Construction Projects in Iraq

Risk is an important decision-making factor for construction projects and can influence how successfully a project will be implemented. If not handled appropriately, it can lead to cost overruns, schedule delays, and even poor quality [1].

Any program has a certain level of Risk. The risks are increasing due to construction projects' increasing complexity and scale. In addition, there are local economic, political, social and cultural elements that will have an impact on the project. A project risk is a risk that, if it does happen, could impact at least one project objective in a good or bad way. Risks can arise through exposure to the effects of uncertainty. Possible outcomes include an event occurring in the context of the project and affecting the objectives. Considerations include the possibility of profit or loss or deviating from a planned or desired outcome due to the uncertainty involved in selecting a particular action plan [2]. Others define Risk as being initiated by the project without concern for potential harm or loss [3].

Threat describes this type of Risk. The threat is defined as an unfavorable state or condition of the project, a set of negative circumstances, the chance that it will negatively affect the project goal if it occurs, or the possibility of unfavorable changes [4].

It is difficult to eliminate risks from a construction project. Therefore, a formal risk management strategy is required to deal with many risks. Risk management is a legal and systematic process to identify, analyze and respond to risks throughout the project's life to achieve the highest level of risk elimination, mitigation and control [5]. Companies need to structure and establish effective risk management processes [6]. Project risks must be identified, assessed, analyzed and responded to for the main actions to show systematic risk management [7]. The risk management system, an essential component of engineering project management, is associated with issuing the best judgments and developing policies to ensure the least possible risks [6].

Risk assessment uses qualitative approaches to prioritize risks affected by project objectives based on determining their likelihood of occurrence and severity. Their influence and quantitative approaches to describe Risk include decision tree analysis, sensitivity analysis, and Monte Carlo simulations [8].

For the reasons of this research, the following reasons were taken into account:

1. The lack of an effective risk management system in Iraqi construction projects leads to many risks that impact the project's initial objectives.

2. To reduce the possibility of exposure to risks and their impact on the cost of construction projects in Iraq.

3. Insufficient documentation records the risks encountered during the project life cycle.

Therefore, the main risk variables affecting Iraqi construction projects and their severity and impact must be identified, evaluated and understood in this study. All projects are fraught with risks, and most of these construction projects suffer from not considering these risks when calculating the project's cost estimates.

This paper is organized as follows: preliminaries.

Described in Section 2. Construction Project Risk Rating in Section 3. Process risk management in the construction project in Section 4. Methodology in Section 5, Sources of Data in Section 6, The questionnaire's design in Section 7, Collection of data in Section 8, Analysis of data in Section 9, Data analysis and discussion in Section 10 and finally a conclusion in Section 11.

The hazards connected to the construction sector can be roughly categorized as follows [14]:

1. Organizational risks: Organizational risks consist of contractual relationships such as the relationship between the contractor and the second contractor and the misunderstanding and agreement that occurs between them, the experience of the contractors, the attitudes of the participants, the inexperienced workforce such as providing staff with little experience to benefit from some of the worker's wages, and communications such as poor communication between The contractor and the employer promise to follow up on matters first.

11.png

Figure 1. Classification of construction project risks

2. Risks associated with site building: Include worker productivity, the state of the job site, equipment breakdowns, design modifications, higher quality requirements, and new technologies.

3. Technical hazards: These include risks related to incomplete designs, inadequate specifications, poor on-site investigations, changes in the scope and methods of construction, a lack of resources, and other factors.

4. Political or security concerns: Include alterations to laws and regulations, safety and pollution rules, law and order, war, and civil unrest.

5. Financial risks: Include higher material costs, decreased demand for the product on the market, fluctuating currency rates, late payments, incorrect appreciation taxes, etc.

6. Legal risks: Delay in receiving operational advances and confiscation of project lands by the state.

7. Environmental risks: Natural disasters, weather, floods and environmental pollution, as shown in Figure 1.

The research approach followed can be summarized as follows: There are 44 risk factors. Based on individual interviews, literature reviews, and field surveys, they were discovered and grouped into seven sources of Risk. As shown in Figure 1. The questionnaire was then distributed to the Ministry of Construction and Housing, the public sector, and a contracting company. Companies in the private sector. Ninety-two questionnaires were distributed to specialized engineers and engineers of different ages of experience, as shown in Table 3.

Seventy questionnaires were received and approved for statistical analysis. Incomplete responses to any questionnaire items led to nine forms being rejected, and 13 other forms were not returned, bringing the response rate to 76% of the total sample size. As a result, the questionnaire was analyzed using a reliability test, where Cronbach's alpha coefficient (C) is used to measure internal consistency. The Cronbach's alpha coefficient (C) measures internal consistency. To give the measurement to evaluate the validity and the inner scale or thickness of the test and the relative importance index approach to examine the acquired data to determine the value of the identified factors. It depends on the probability of the Risk occurring and the consequences (consequences). Then, the risk score was found, and a risk assessment was performed based on the classification of risk factors, the severity of the risks, and the extent of the impact of the RII periods, which will be explained in the next stages. Therefore, the results identified the most important risk variables that affect construction projects at the planning stage in Iraq.

According to the survey's questionnaire, several specific danger variables may influence Iraqi building projects.

Field observations, in-person interviews with several engineers and managers working in the housing and construction industries, information gathered from the literature review, and Two sections make up the questionnaire form, the first of which requests general information. About the research project, A second part of the questionnaire included identifying 44 Risk factors. Respondents were asked to indicate the likelihood of occurrence and the effect level regarding their impact on construction projects in Iraq during the planning stage. Each factor on a five-point Likert scale is Strongly Accept, Accept, Neutral, Disagree, or Strongly Disagree. Housing and Construction Sector engineers formed the study community based on the research's aim. Before the questionnaire was made public, a commission of five arbitrators was constituted to evaluate its performance, as shown in Table 2. This committee studied these various risk factors, and some factors were added and deleted until the final form of the questionnaire was reached, as shown in the attached appendix.

Table 2. Personal qualification of arbitrators

IBM SPSS V26 and Microsoft Excel applications were used for the analysis.

9.1 Reliability testing

Reliability research There are two methods used to carry it out. External reliability analysis comes first. Testing is done repeatedly, and results are compared. The second technique is internal reliability analysis. Uses As soon as the information is gathered for dependability analysis. This technique the analytical process includes several components. Credibility The consistency of the objects is tested to determine the modulus.

Internal reliability analysis often uses techniques like Half Spearman-Brown and Alpha Cronbach [20].

The reliability and internal consistency were evaluated for each questionnaire component using Cronbach's alpha coefficient (C). (C) always has a value between 0 and 1. The stability improves as the value approaches one, and vice versa. Cronbach's alpha values for this search are in the range of 0.923, according to Table 4, which indicates the validity and reliability of the questionnaire, which should be more than 0.7 [21].

Table 4. A questionnaire's Cronbach's alpha

9.2 Normality test

A normality test should be completed to determine if the data collected from a questionnaire is normally distributed. The Shapiro-Wilk test, Kolmogorov-Smirnov test, skewness, kurtosis, histogram, box plot, P-P plot, and Q-Q plot are just a few of the methods that may be used to check for normalcy. And the Kolmogorov-Smirnov and Shapiro-Wilk tests are the most often used techniques. The Kolmogorov-Smirnov test was chosen because the sample size was more than 50.

Table 5 shows the results of the standardization of the questionnaire data.

The results showed that the significant level of the included data is greater than (mark 0.05). Therefore, all survey data are distributed in a normal distribution. In addition to performing a normality test, skewness and kurtosis values are calculated. Skewness is a measure of the irregularity or homogeneity of a normal distribution. Standard deviation is widely regarded as one of the most important and accurate measures of dispersion and the most common and commonly used in statistical analysis. While kurtosis is a measure of a distribution's peak, the data's distribution is symmetric when it progresses in the same direction to the left and right of the central point.

Table 5. Normal distribution test

Uses some descriptive statistics to demonstrate shown in Table 6.

Table 6. Sample descriptive statistics

9.3 The index of relative importance

Check out survey responses on statistical measurements for extra inspiration. By evaluating the Relative Importance Index, these parameters were rated according to the significance of their influence on building projects (RII). It is used to determine how crucial it is to prioritize the many risks that impact building projects during the planning stage. The significance index was the percentage calculated for each risk factor by using the Eq. (1) [22]:

$R I I=\Sigma W / A * N(0 \leq R I I \leq 1)$         (1)

W: is the score assigned to each component and typically varies from (1 to 5).

(Where "1" is "no" and "5" is "always");

N: is the size of a file sample questionnaire, and A: is the maximum score (in this case, 5).

(i.e., 70 in this study).

Whereas the relative relevance index was used in the second section of the questionnaire to evaluate all risks.

9.4 Degree of risk

Using the relative relevance index (RII) for each Risk's chance of occurrence and its effect on the elements listed in the questionnaire it is used to conduct a qualitative risk analysis of the risk factors that result in cost overruns for building projects. The equation can calculate the degree of Risk (2) [23].

Degree of Risk $=$ Likelihood ${ }^*$ Effect           (2)

Determine the deviation (D) between the highest risk score value and the RII intervals to assess the risk score's effect level. and the lowest value, as seen in Table 7 [24].

D=0.559-0.221=0.338.

Table 7. Level of RII interval influence

Table 7 shows the influence level of the RII intervals used to determine the risk severity/score based on the minimum and maximum risk severity limitations.

The primary focus of this research paper was to identify and evaluate the myriad risks impacting projects, utilizing the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) for statistical analysis. The results pinpointed the most significant potential risks through a questionnaire technique employed for data collection and evaluation of each identified Risk. Forty-four risk variables were presented and analyzed in this article based on the responses garnered from the questionnaire.

• The risk indicators, based on their risk index/score, were categorized into seven risk sources considering the likelihood and severity of risks and their degree of impact on Iraqi construction tasks during the planning phase.

• The results highlighted the crucial risk elements that warrant consideration during risk management.

1. In most instances, participants and stakeholders in Iraqi construction projects have not adopted risk management methodologies. Hence, the development of a suitable risk management methodology is imperative.

2. A qualitative analysis was conducted to assess the degree of Risk, followed by identifying initial risk variables, encompassing 15 out of the 44 risk categories accountable for risks in Iraqi residential construction projects. The most concerning was "outsourcing work to an incompetent contractor" (RII 55.9%), followed by the deterioration of the security situation (RII 47.8%), and then the presence of obstacles at the site (like groundwater, water pipes, electrical installations, etc.) at (RII 44.7%). The organizational risk factor was the lack of plans for service networks passing through the location (such as electricity, telephone, water, etc.) at (44.2% RII).

3. Various risk factors were classified into seven sources (categories) of Risk, based on their arrangement, revealing "technical (related to contractors), political or security, organizational, financial" as the most significant indicator among other sources of Risk.

• We believe the objective of the risk management process should be to detect, analyze, assess, and prevent the evolution of various risks and associated hazards in a systematic and ongoing manner.

• Expanding the research to develop a model considering threats, hazards, and urgent dangers is essential. Recommendations for future research to enhance risk management in Iraqi construction projects are advisable.