Construction Risk Management Under Pandemic Conditions: An Activity-Level Assessment of Construction Activities in Indonesia

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic significantly disrupted construction projects worldwide by introducing risks related to occupational health and safety (OHS), workforce availability, and material supply. While previous studies have largely focused on project- and organizational-level impacts, limited empirical research has examined how pandemic-related risks affect individual construction activities. This study investigates pandemic-related risks from an activity-level perspective and proposes mitigation strategies based on evidence from a developing-country context. A descriptive quantitative approach was employed using a questionnaire survey of 112 construction practitioners involved in active projects during the pandemic. Data were analyzed using Mean Score Analysis and the Relative Importance Index (RII) to evaluate the severity of risks affecting construction stakeholders and specific construction activities. The results show that OHS was the most critical risk category (mean = 3.82), followed by labor availability (3.71) and material procurement (3.58). At the activity level, masonry work was the most affected (mean = 3.79), followed by earthwork (3.63) and concrete work (3.49). These findings indicate that pandemic-related risks are unevenly distributed across construction activities, with labor-intensive activities being particularly vulnerable to health restrictions and workforce disruptions. This study extends construction risk management literature by introducing an activity-level assessment perspective and emphasizes the need to integrate health-related risks into conventional risk management frameworks while adopting activity-specific mitigation strategies to improve resilience against future public health emergencies and other large-scale disruptions.