During the 2020 pandemic, 66 Armed Police Force border outposts were constructed along the border of India and China. In that time of emergency and constrained budget allocated by the Government of Nepal prefabricated method of construction was chosen to be adopted and at that time this construction method was gaining popularity since the 2015 earthquake. As construction in security forces are similar most of the time designs are repeating type. The barrack, administration office, mess, restrooms, etc. are similar in every unit, so adopting a prefabricated structure was a good choice at that time. However, this study explores the challenges and opportunities of using prefabricated construction and effective strategies to minimize the challenges to implementing prefabricated construction in the Armed Police Force border outpost and other units as well. Very limited or negligible research has been conducted on the opportunities and challenges of prefabricated construction for swift and dependable buildings. This study aims to address this deficiency in research specific to the Armed Police Border Observation Post. The research aims to determine major opportunities and challenges of prefabricated construction in APF BOP and ultimately identify the effective possible remedial measures to minimize risk and challenges to implementing prefab construction. The methodology includes stakeholder interviews, field research, and a questionnaire survey. key Information Interview from 4 filed expert questionnaires for clients, contractors, and consultants who were involved in the construction of such security forces unit. The APF BOP constructed was visited to collect the field data. Out of 125, 118 validated responses were analyzed for this study i.e., 94.5 % completed filled respondents. Relative Importance Index and Spearman Correlation analysis tool have been used for statistical analysis, and KII for thematic analysis. The top opportunities identified from this study include a reduction in construction time; improved productivity; and reduced rework. Similarly, the top challenges include Insufficient spreading of knowledge regarding prefabricated construction within society; Clients’ skepticism/suspicion about performance; and the lack of skilled viii workers. The findings are expected to aid the prefabricated construction stakeholders in better understanding the opportunities and challenges that they can investigate. Such investigation can further lead to the identification of the solutions to the challenges and hence wider adaptation for the prefabricated construction in security forces like APF where the concept of prefabricated construction is still new.

Keywords

prefabricated Construction, Nepal Border Observation Post, Relative Importance Index, Armed Police Border, Challenge and Opportunities.

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