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Exploring Critical Factors Affecting Delay in Construction Projects in Iraq: A review

    Authors

    1 Department of Civil Engineering, College of Engineering, University of Kerbala

    2 Department of Construction and Projects, University of Kerbala.

    3 Department of Hydraulic Structures and Water Resources, College of Civil Engineering, University of Technology, Iraq

,

Document Type : Review Article
10.63463/kjes.1196

Abstract

The construction sector is considered an important part of improving the economy and enhance the development of the countries. Therefore, executing a construction project with the signed time in the contract is essential to fix the general plan. On this base, construction delay will obstruct the estimated plan end and start another project. This literature review studies the recent articles in Iraq ten year ago by exploring the methodologies and the most reasons of delay in construction projects in different cities such as, Baghdad and Najaf. This study analyzed 12 articles and search respective to the used method; delay causes and mitigation. The results were 31 causes of delay in construction projects were selected but the most reason of delay is financial problems by both contractor and owner which repeated five times in the study articles, however, political and management issues repeated four times in the articles. Study conclusions that financial and management represent the main cause of delay. To avoid the possible delay in completing construction project in Iraq, project owners should put suitable plan with suitable payments in project budget and selecting management plan to solve any possible problems, however, political issues cause delay in construction projects without any mitigation from both contractor and owner.

Keywords

References
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Kerbala Journal for Engineering Sciences
Volume 5, Issue 4
December 2025
Pages 140-149
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