The challenges and benefits associated with healthcare infrastructure provision by public private partnerships in South Africa.

Abstract

ABSTRACT The purpose of this research was to identify the challenges and benefits associated with healthcare infrastructure provision by Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) in South Africa. Contract choice and the initial conditions that have to be met strongly influence the success or failure of PPPs (Pollitt and Bouckaert (2000). How the challenges associated with PPPs are perceived by industry experts and government specialists, contributes to their choice of procurement in the delivery of healthcare infrastructure provision. Ten research questions in the form of perceptions were identified from the literature, and accordingly were to be tested within the South African context to reveal their appropriateness. Semi-structured interviews were used to collect data from several public-private partnership practitioners within the South African health sector. Fifteen interviews were conducted with experienced and senior ranking stakeholders from both the public and private sectors representing government, transaction advisors and construction professionals. Content analysis was then performed on the data collected. The research argues that not all of the ten identified propositions were applicable to the South African public-private partnership environment. Notably propositions like the rapid delivery of infrastructure barely getting any agreement. However perceptions formulated outside the literature review proved to be more significant, like the perception that PPPs facilitates core business focus enabling the government to focus on their core function of providing health services to the public, and that the true life cycle cost considerations enable longer lifespans for the infrastructure. Interestingly, the findings of this work in terms of levels of significance generally differed with the conclusions of related research that was discussed in the literature.