PARTNERING CONTRACT IN DUBAI PORTS FREE ZONE

Partnering Contract in Dubai Ports Free Zone

Partnering Contract in Dubai Ports Free Zone

(Proposal)

Chapter 1: Introduction

Reason for Intended Research:

Dubai Ports/Free Zone is constructing many typical projects such as Lease office buildings, Light industrial units, Food courts, Container terminal expansions, Cargo berths and Infrastructure developments etc on regular basis. After carefully analysing tender reports and recommendations, mostly two reputed leading contractors winning all these projects. In view of the above, Partnering procurement is a correct choice to adopt in Dubai Ports/Free Zone contracts and it will save tendering time and cost, also gives value for money. Therefore I would like to do my research on this topic.

Aim for the Research:

The aim of this dissertation is to identify and define the key words in the traditional contract and highlight the ambiguous clauses which cause disputes and conflicts and affect the contract performance. Furthermore, introduce the Partnering contracts to the Dubai Ports / Free Zone development projects as a gateway to eliminate the poor performance of the traditional contracts.

Objectives for the Research

Identify the condition of contract clauses which affect the contract performance related to clarity, time, payment and cost.

Measure the awareness of the construction industries operating in Dubai Ports/Free Zone in regards to their knoawledge of the Early Warning System.

Identify the common attributed causes behind the disputes and claims in Dubai Ports/Free Zone construction environment.

Introduction of the Partnering Contracts to the construction industry in Dubai Ports/Free Zone as a gateway to eliminate the traditional contracts.

Background for the Research

Partnership sourcing is often perceived as the best approach to achieving supply chain improvement through the development of more effective customer-supplier relationships. A large body of literature now exists which presents various approaches to the general idea from a wide range of industrial and academic perspectives (Moore et al., 1992; Carr and Truesdale, 1992; Macbeth and Ferguson, 1994), including dyadic collaborative relationships, the network concept in relationship marketing and the development of strategic alliances (Harland, 1996; Harland et al., 1999). Nevertheless, as a number of articles and reports (Lamming, 1994; Burnes and New, 1996; Watson, 1999) have shown, this is an area where rhetoric seems to be moving well ahead of reality. It is certainly true that partnership sourcing is described in simplistic terms, thus making the potential benefits appear easier to achieve than is the case. In addition, the distribution of the benefits that can be achieved through customer-supplier improvement activities is a more contentious issue than much of the literature acknowledges.

New and Ramsey (1997) conducted an empirical study of the benefits to be gained from collaborative buyer-supplier relationships. They found that the distribution of the costs of improvement activities were biased towards suppliers rather than the customer. However, the benefits from these activities were biased towards customers. This is supported within the construction industry, with Watson (1999) noting that despite all the positive publicity of partnering, the benefits of effective supply chain partnering are not being passed to subcontractors ...