Influence of Cost Control Practices on Performance of Fish Farming Projects Funded by the Kiambu County Government, KENYA

The fish farming Projects in Kiambu County has not performed as per the intended plans for food security, improving nutrition status, creating employment and eradication of poverty among the beneficiaries. Cost of inputs, technology and marketing challenges of individual farmers has rendered sustainability of profitability of farm pond projects uncertain. Despite the high number of fisheries projects born annually in the county, their mortality rate remains very high even though limited scholars are trying to research on the causative factors. The main objective of continuous improvement programs is not only to meet customer's requirements, but to do it at the lowest cost as well, this study focused on the cost control area in project management. The general objective of this research was to determine the influence of cost control practices on the performance of fish farming projects funded by the Kiambu County government. Specifically, the study sought to determine the influence of budgeting, standard costing and financial training on performance of fish farming projects. The study was anchored on the performance theory, theory of budget and the theory of cost. The study was conducted using descriptive research design in order to drawan accurate snapshot of some aspects of cost control practices in fish farming projects. The target populations comprised 60 fish farming projects. Due to the manageable size of population, census approach was appropriate for the study. Structured questionnaires were used as the instrument for data collection. A pilot study was done in Nakuru County using six projects. Validity test of the research instrument was determined through consultation with university research supervisor and practitioners. The data was analyzed with the aid of Statistical Package for Social Sciences. Correlation analysis was used to estimate the strength and direction of the relationship between variables and regression model was used to make predictions about the population and analysis of the sample. The results were presented in tables. The study established that standard costing (r = 0.644**, p= .000) and financial training (r = 0.637**, p = .000) had a strong positive correlation with performance of fish projects while budgeting (r = 0.135, p = .355) had a weak positive correlation with performance of fish projects which indicates that the level of standard costing and financial training significantly influences the performance of fish farming projects in Kiambu County, Kenya. The fitted model R-square of 0.512 was an indication that the three cost control practices explained 51.2% of the variation in the performance of fish projects. The study concluded that standard costing and financial training was significant predictors of performance of fish farming projects while budgeting though a predictor was not significant at 5%. The study recommended that government agencies should enhance financial training amongst project participants in order to enhance their outputs. Further, standard costing should be structured into the project mechanism for enhanced performance. Since past studies report the importance of budgeting in the project process, mechanism of simplifying the budget process should be inculcated in the financial training programs.