QUALITY MANAGEMENT SYSTEM PRACTICES AND CHALLENGES IN ETHIOPIAN SUGAR INDUSTRY: THE CASE OF METAHARA SUGAR FACTORY

Abstract

Quality is a widely used concept that has become one of the primary agenda in most manufacturing and service providing organizations. Therefore, this research was aimed at Practices of Quality Management System and identifies challenges to implement Quality management System in Metahara Sugar Factory. Descriptive type of research was used and Both primary and secondary data sources were used for the study. The study gathered information from 333 Metahara Sugar factory employees. A self-administered questionnaire was used to collect primary data from Metahara Sugar Factory employees, and secondary was gathered from recorded data of sugar Factory. The collected data was analyzed using SPSS21. The findings revealed that QMS practices are lacking leadership viewpoints, customer focus, and process approach. The practice was at its pinnacle during the deployment of the Quality Management System and is currently declining. As a result, output and productivity are declining. However, the factory's has good relationship with the community, employees, and other stakeholders. Employee initiatives for improvement, motivation, understanding of quality policy, applications, and understanding of Quality goals are core values in the factory. The primary challenging elements of quality management system practices in industries are outdated technology, lack of input for production, competent human resources, financial resources, senior management commitment, government backing, a lack of quality audits, and security challenges are bottleneck for Quality management system practice in the industry. Encouraging best practices of the factory and avoiding those hurdles can reduce backing quality management practice and important for rehabilitation of QMS or introducing new system like ESG are very crucial for existence of industry, thus place the industry in a more acceptable and competent position, making the nation proud.