Quantifying barriers to sustainable material adoption in emerging markets using fuzzy synthetic evaluation

Purpose Despite widespread awareness of sustainable construction materials (SCM), adoption remains limited in Nigeria, constrained by multidimensional barriers embedded in institutional, regulatory, market, and supply-chain systems. This study quantifies adoption readiness using fuzzy synthetic evaluation (FSE), addressing the analytical gap left by traditional methods that cannot adequately account for the uncertainty, subjectivity, and linguistic vagueness inherent in professional judgments about emerging materials. Design/methodology/approach Data were collected via structured questionnaires from 273 architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) professionals in Nigeria. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was used to identify four latent barrier dimensions. Fuzzy synthetic evaluation was then employed to construct a hierarchical assessment framework, using full Likert-scale distributions to form fuzzy relation matrices and mean-based weighting to reflect relative barrier importance. An Adoption Readiness Index (ARI) was computed through weighted defuzzification. Findings EFA extracted four latent dimensions: Institutional Fragmentation and Incentive Deficiency (C1), Regulatory Complexity and Performance Uncertainty (C2), Policy Weakness and Market Apathy (C3), and Cost Burden and Supply Constraints (C4). The overall ARI of 28.41/100 indicates critically low readiness, with more than 70% of the fuzzy membership concentrated in the “Very Low” and “Low” states. Component-level analyses reveal Policy/Market Readiness (C3: ARI 22.04) and Cost/Supply (C4: ARI 26.67) as the weakest dimensions, while Institutional/Incentive (C1: ARI 29.67) and Regulatory/Performance (C2: ARI 31.78) show marginally higher but still insufficient readiness levels. Originality/value This study advances beyond descriptive barrier rankings by operationalizing an integrated EFA-FSE framework that quantifies readiness while preserving uncertainty. By anchoring fuzzy evaluation in empirically validated constructs, the research provides a replicable, transferable methodology for national benchmarking and cross-country comparative studies, contributing to both sustainable construction theory and evidence-informed policymaking.