Factors Affecting the Adoption of Ict on Project Planning in the Nigerian Food and Beverage Industry

Abstract

<p>This study identified the nature of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) adopted on project planning activities and examined the factors affecting the adoption of these ICT on project planning in the Food and Beverage Industry in Nigeria. The study was carried out through the use of questionnaire and interview schedule to a total of forty five (45) respondents across ICT, Production and Project departments of food and beverage firms in southwestern Nigeria. This was used to elicit information on the factors affecting the adoption of ICT in the industry. Data collected were analysed using both descriptive and inferential statistics. The study revealed that the major ICT adopted by food and beverage firms in Nigeria were Enterprise resource planning (4.48), Product lifecycle management (4.29), Customer Relationship Management (4.19), Supply Chain Management (4.34), Management Information Systems (4.38), Portable Data Collection Hand Held (4.65), Virtual Private Networks (4.53), Internet and e-mail (4.77). All of these ICTs had a mean rank of 4.00 and above on a 5 point-likert scales.Three factors were identified to influence ICT adoption. These include Human Resource capacity (52.8%), level of ICT investment (47.2%) and ICT competency (69.4%). Furthermore, regression analysis showed that level of ICT on Investment (r = -.425^**: p&lt;0.05) and Employee Competency (r = -.634^**: p&lt;0.05) are factors which had significant influence on ICT adoption in the project planning activities of the firms. In conclusion, the study revealed that Level of ICT investment and employee ICT competency are factors that significantly influence the adoption of ICT in the selected firms. These factors were found to be critical hindrances to ICT adoption in Nigerian food and beverage industry.</p>