Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on risk factors in residential projects

Abstract

The global economy was affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. This paper estimates the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the overall risk of construction projects in Egypt and identifies risk factors affected by the pandemic. A structured questionnaire was designed to collect data. One hundred thirty-two cases before the COVID-19 pandemic and 68 cases after the pandemic were managed. The outliers were excluded using Mahalanobis distance. The distribution of the samples before and after the COVID-19 pandemic was studied using the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test and the difference in medians using the Mann-Whitney U test. The delay in payment and the fluctuation in material prices are the most critical risk factors after the epidemic spread in residential projects in Egypt. Suspension of projects has been the most significant consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic, and the pandemic increased the overall risk by 17%. This research helps to identify the main risk factors after the pandemic, and then the project manager can prepare an appropriate risk response plan.