Integrity in public procurement: tools for implementation

1. Public procurement is a process that goes right to the core of good governance. Governance combines efficiency and fairness. Accordingly, the objective is to establish a system that can satisfy the needs of the government purchaser, the supplier and the general public, including the final beneficiary, the user, and the person who actually pays taxes, duties and charges to the central government, local government, and public enterprises. 2. To achieve this objective, certain requirements must be met: - Technical and financial responsibility: the responsibilities of the various people involved in the procurement procedure must be clearly defined. - Professionalism: the agents responsible for implementing procedures must be trained in order to do their job properly. - Transparency: all interested parties must know and understand the rules, procedures and decisions. - Competition: suppliers and products should not be subject to needless eligibility restrictions. 3. Procurement should be organised in ways that take these requirements into account. It should allow users (or beneficiaries) to obtain what they need, at the appointed place and within the established time limits. At the same time, buyers should be able to procure supplies, works and services at the best price, to ensure "value for money". 4. That organisation will also have to cope with certain constraints: - Inadequate transparency, because of undue commercial influence or political interference. - Budgetary constraints that require coordination. - Technical expertise is essential, because of the infinite variety of procurement. - Fragmented demand, which requires choosing, in light of the goods or services to be procured, between a centralised, a decentralised or a mixed public purchasing organisation. 5. Instituting a coherent, clear and efficient public procurement system is a complex operation, then, as it must respond to the demands of transparency and integrity to which all international organisations subscribe.