Arai, K and Morimoto, E (2020) Renovation of the Japanese construction industry: Evaluation of i-Construction from the perspective of construction management. In: Scott, L and Neilson, C J (eds.) Proceedings of 36th Annual ARCOM Conference, 7-8 September 2020, Online Event, UK.
Abstract
Japan's population is decreasing and aging is progressing. The diligent and abundant labor force that has supported the economy will continue to decline, and improving productivity is a challenge. The “i-Construction,” which drastically improves productivity in all construction production processes from survey to design, construction, inspection, maintenance and renewal, is one of the important measures, and the i-Construction Report was compiled by the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport, and Tourism in April 2016. Based on the rapid development of satellite positioning technology and the Internet of Things, the report summarizes the viewpoints for advancing i-Construction in three categories: "Turning Construction Sites into Advanced Factories" "Introduction of advanced supply chain management at construction sites" and "Regulation of construction sites, breaking stereotypes and continuing "Kaizen"". As a top runner policy from these 3 perspectives, "Full utilisation of ICT (ICT earthwork)", "Optimal overall deployment" and "Leveling of construction time" were set, and the characteristic of this policy is that it lists the items to be tackled for each. In addition, as a mechanism for promoting i-Construction, it is proposed to develop a national promotion system, establish a public-private partnership consortium, utilise big data, collaborate with other outdoor industries, and expand overseas. This study evaluates and analyzes Japan's efforts from the viewpoint of the construction management research, and arranges how the construction management research is utilised in the policy practice actually carried out in Japan, and what is considered for the feedback from the policy to the research. In this paper, we reevaluate Japan's i-Construction efforts from two perspectives, (1) interdisciplinary perspective and (2) more practical implementation of research, which have been taken up in previous studies of Construction Management and Economics, to identify the keys to their success, and to verify the points of attention that contribute to both practical and research.
| Item Type: | Conference Paper (Paper) |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | i-construction; Japan; productivity |
| Index terms: | tourism, renovation, population, regulation, implementation, construction production process, internet, construction industry, satellite, land, construction time, renewal, earthwork, consortium, stereotype, management research, promotion, labour force, productivity, construction site, partnership, big data, survey, inspection, Japan |
| Subjects: | research design and methodology, data collection methods, computing systems, real estate economics, work location, operations management, construction methods, contractual arrangements, economics, management, renovation and retrofit, Geography, sociology, project controls, networking, demography, partnership management, political science, information systems, quality assurance, industry analysis |
| Topics: | Business Strategy, Research Practice, Geographical Context, Engineering Principles, Stakeholder Management, Procurement, Governance, Digital Applications, Urban Studies, Quality Management, Human Resources, Supply Chain Management, Time Control, Site Management |
| Descriptive scope: | 5 PCTEA |
N.B. Descriptive scope is a count of how many of the five facets of empirical research are indicated by the words used in title, abstract and keywords. It is not intended as a judgement on the research; merely a count of the kind of word we would expect to indicate Phenomenon, Concepts, Theoretical framing, Empirical techniques, Analytical techniques. If all five are present, then a code of “5 PCTEA” will indicate this. If you feel the coding for this record is questionable, we welcome discussion around the terms we matched or the way we categorized them. The facet you would expect may not be coded, or a facet may be coded inappropriately. This can also bear on a larger question, of which facets should be treated as defining in construction management research. Please get in touch, and we will look at it. More details here