Joint WTO/WB Regional Workshop on Procurement Reforms

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Joint WTO/WB Regional Workshop on Procurement
Reforms

• Overview of Procurement Reforms in Africa
• Bernard Abeillé
• Regional Procurement Adviser at the World bank
• January 14-17, 2003

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Fiduciary Responsibility

• WBs Legal Obligations
• The Bank has a fiduciary responsibility to ensure
  that the proceeds of any loan/credit are used
  only for the purposes for which the loan was
  granted, with due attention to considerations of
  economy and efficiency, and without regard to
  political or other non-economic influences or
  considerations.

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Fiduciary Responsibility

• To fulfil its fiduciary responsibility, the Bank
  has established detailed Guidelines
• Basic principles governing the Banks Procurement
  Policies are
• Need for economy and efficiency
• All eligible bidders have equal opportunity
• Development of domestic contracting
• Transparency in the procurement process

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Current Trend includes

• Moving from transaction-intensive fiduciary work
  to the development of sound national fiduciary
  systems
• Sound public procurement policies and practices
  are among the essential elements of good
  governance
• Being prepared to work on Multi-Donor Budget
  Supports (MDBS), SWAPs and PRSCs
• Appropriateness of Expenditures

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Sound National Procurement Systems

• To ensure that sound national procurement systems
  are in place, the Bank carries out
• Capacity Assessments
• Country Procurement Assessment Reports (CPARs)
• Jointly with Government and other MDBs
• Share its analysis/findings -- including risks
• CPAR Recommendations, in general, lead to
• An Action Plan, and
• ? A Procurement Reform

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CPARs Follow-up

• As part of Country Dialogue Capacity Building,
  the Bank
• Discusses action plans
• Provides grants to support procurement reforms
• Establishes triggers related to procurement as
  part of policy packages
• Organizes country and sub-regional Procurement
  Training Programs
• Sub-Regional Organizations will play a major role
  (WAEMU, COMESA )
• Partnership with other donors is growing rapidly
  in this area

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Frequent Structural Problems

• Lack of public expenditures management
  systems/controls
• Lack of Procurement E M systems
• Complexity of national procedures ? Slow
  process and weak absorptive capacity
• High unit prices -- resulting from various
  factors, in particular the evaluation by bidders
  of country specific commercial risks
• Lack of efficient, transparent and independent
  appeal mechanisms (to establish confidence an
  partnership with the private sector)

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Frequent Deficient Practices

• Slicing and poor packaging of contracts
• Limited advertisement and insufficient
  competition
• Abuse of direct contracting as a response to
  critical situations
• Inadequacy of bid evaluation criteria
• Modification of bid evaluation criteria after bid
  opening
• Negotiations of terms and conditions of contracts
  after contract award

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Key Principles for a good procurement system

• Effective Advertisement (broad sufficient time)
• Public Bid Opening (immediate opening of all
  financial bids)
• Well-formulated Bidding Documents
• Bid Evaluation Criteria (non-discriminatory,
  disclosed, and in monetary terms)
• Qualification of bidders reviewed separately
• Contract Award to the lowest evaluated bidder --
  without negotiations

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Procedures should exclude

• Use of two-envelope systems (except for
  Consultants)
• Use of merit-point system to evaluate bids
  (except for Consultants)
• Combination of bid evaluation with qualification
• Use of non-quantified bid evaluation criteria
• Restricting access to bidding process

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Modern Procurement Regulations

• Loosing bidders must have an effective way to
  submit protests
• Protests submitted to an independent entity
• Protests before contract award may lead to
  suspend the contract award decision
• Protests after contract award may lead to
  compensatory damages
• Contracting Entities
• Conducting bid evaluations are distinct from
  those having a regulatory/control functions
• Have access to a series of standard documents
  and computerized information systems

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Strategy for Efficiency

• Enhance accountability of contracting entities,
  but
• install independent audits efficient controls
  sanctions
• Eliminate steps and controls with no value-added
• Enforce the use of Procurement Plans
• Reconcile budget programming and contract
  execution
• Associate the private sector in the oversight of
  the procurement through their participation in
• Control and surveillance
• Information systems
• Regulatory Body
• Appeal Mechanisms

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Observatory of Country Procurement Reforms

• The Bank is maintaining for the Africa Region a
  Ranking Index of Country Procurement Reforms to
  monitor progress on
• Legal Procurement Framework Regulations
• Procurement Practices Standard Tools
• Institutional Capacity Proficiency of Staff
• Independent Control Systems Appeal Mechanisms
• Anti-Corruption Measures

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Ranking Index of 27 African Countries
Ratings of Countries
1-2 0 0
2-3 0 0
3-4 13 48
4-5 14 44
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Why Procurement Reforms become so important ?

• In the past, donors procedures were used for the
  largest part of investments (gt80)
• Now, with Multi-Donor Budget Support (MDBS),
  national systems are playing a growing role
• The Bank is ready to increase Proc. Review
  Thresholds (PRTs) if national systems are found
  acceptable
• Better national systems are performing, more
  donors are able to accept national procedures
• Procurement Reforms are at the center of
• WB Country Assistance Strategy (CAS) and
• PRSCs MDBS

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End remarks

• Having sound national Procurement systems
• in place
• poses a tremendous challenge
• which requires sustained commitment
• on the part of political leaders
• pressure from society

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END