ABSTRACT
In this paper, the present situation of forest project implementation and forest enterprise management in China is analysed. The government directly manages projects,which become less and less suitable for the economic development. Suggestions for change and improvement at the management level are given. Also, the advantage in the implementation of the Sino-German Afforestation Project, and objectives of the project are given. Its practices show that it is absolutely possible to transform the existing government organization in project management into a legal independent corporation.
INTRODUCTION
The practical implementation of the Sino-German Afforestation Project in China is an important experiment in efforts towards reforming Chinese forestry with advanced international forestry. As the project involves six state forest projects, and realizing the wide scope for the development of forestry, a lot of demonstrations and research should be done on improving the policy system, technical standardization and project management, especially the project management. Then effort must be made to promote the transformation of the government’s role in forest project management and enterprises to remove government influence from the enterprises, and to realize the development objective of social forestry. During the project, more and more subprojects along with their management methodologies have being introduced; the scale of forestry industries and project areas has been increased, particularly in the recent five years. Meanwhile many publications concerning the project management have been issued. The international certification system, institutes and organizations for project management and knowledge systems such as PMI, IPMA and Cambridge University have come to China, and more and more attention and recognition from enterprises, investment companies, academe and governments at every level focus on the project management field. The project management has witnessed great achievements in the opening-up and reform that have taken place in the country in the last 20 years.
EXISTING FOREST PROJECT MANAGEMENT AND ITS WEAKNESSES
The government has directly managed projects for a long time. In forestry, the Forest Department (Bureau) manages forest projects. The strategy of transforming the government’s function and removing the government’s role from enterprises was proposed in the 1980s. However, till now that issue is still not resolved completely and it also has not been given due attention and recognition. The administration and management by the government have become less and less suitable for the economic development.
DIFFICULTY OF REMOVING THE GOVERNMENT’S ROLE FROM THE ENTERPRISES
If a person participates in a sport both as an athlete and a judge, he would surely give himself high scores, leading to a biased situation. Such a situation really exists in some enterprises such as the railway board, which is a highly monopolized enterprise, and with the government and enterprise running the board together, no one would win. Under the terms of the WTO, the government should set up an equal competition system and create a fair market environment, with all related enterprises having an equal chance.
NEW OPPORTUNITY AND REQUIREMENTS FOR REFORM
The six state afforestation projects will be a new large-scale operation implemented by a new policy, invested with large finance and labour force. However, it lacks project managers who act between the government and the farms at the middle level. Fortunately, the Sino-foreign finance cooperation projects can assume this task.
Now the forest project is able to take over the administration from the government. Setting up a new institution with new policies and corporate persons is necessary to accelerate the transformation of the government’s function in forest projects, so that the projects meet the economic requirements of society in an open market system. The main activities needed to transform the government’s function are as follows: (1) The government keeps to the function of providing public services such as to maintain market order and to protect the environment; (2) Some functions, for instance the obligations of the enterprises, supervision of accounting and publishing information, should be transferred to the guilds, agencies and other non-governmental organizations; (3) Some of the government functions such as the management of human resources, finances and technology in the enterprises should be privatized; (4) Functions such as investment strategies, financial operations, selection of managers and distribution of benefits should be done by the enterprises themselves. In order to complete the transformation, a key activity is to quickly establish autonomous guilds.
Developing and putting in place corporate project managers are very important for the reform of the forestry management system. The progress of implementation and standardization of management is one of the important indicators for the development of a market economy. All this would happen in the reform undertaken by both the government and the enterprises in the development process of a market system and non-state economy.
ADVANTAGE OF THE SINO-GERMAN FINANCE COOPERATION AFFORESTA-TION PROJECT
The Sino-German Afforestation Project was conducted under the responsibility of the project executing agency, which is a nominal legal system. That is the middle-level agency that runs and manages the project. It fills an important gap in the overall management.
OBJECTIVES AND ACTIVITIES OF THE SINO-GERMAN AFFORESTATION PROJECT
The forest project management in the transforming phase was characterized by its dependence on the government. So the first objective was to set up an example of high technology and state-of-the-art management mode. It has been shown that it is possible for the existing agency to implement the afforestation project with the nominal function of the government acting to transfer it into a legal independent project executing organization, that is to remove the organization from the government and run it as an enterprise.
In order to build up vigour in running and managing the organization, firstly the organization should work in the interest of the enterprise, serve whole-heartedly, maintain its corporate image and enhance its benefits. Meanwhile the government should give away and distribute some of its functions to accelerate the transformation. The organization itself should set up a standard system with real autonomous regulations and highly effective operations.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Lu, Y. 2002. Discussion on the problems related to the project management. China Project Management Network.
Wu, B. & Ye, J. 2000. Theory and practices of international development project. Beijing, China Forestry Publishing House.
Xu, W. & Cai, C. 2002. Review on the development and prospect of project management in China. China Project Management Network.
Ye, J., Liu, J. & Lin, Z. 2001. Participation, organization and development. Beijing, China Forestry Publishing House.
Zhang, S. & Chen, F. 2002. Conflicts between Chinese traditional culture and modern project management. China Project Management Network.
| [31] Sino-German Afforestation
Project Office, Hunan Forestry Department, Hunan Province, China; E-mail:
jlj2542@yahoo. com.cn [32] Sino-German Afforestation Project Office, Hunan Forestry Department, Hunan Province, China; E-mail: jlj2542@yahoo. com.cn |
