ZCZC
BSS-05
E-GP-PROGRESS
80pc of public procurement comes under e-GP
DHAKA, Jan 8, 2018 (BSS) – The electronic government procurement (e-GP)
till date witnessed an exponential growth since its introduction in 2011 to
conduct public procurement online as about 80 percent of country’s total
public procurement up to the value of Taka 100 crore have come under e-GP
till December 2017.
“The reason behind such a growth is accepted by private sector tenderers
and government procuring entities because they wanted a system in tendering
process which will be free from any physical obstruction, influence and
hassles,” said Md Faruque Hossain, Director General of Central Procurement
Technical Unit (CPTU) of Implementation Monitoring and Evaluation Division
(IMED) under the Ministry of Planning.
While talking to the BSS, he said: “The e-GP success has earned accolade at
home and abroad. Bangladesh is in a leading position in e-GP implementation
in South Asia and beyond.”
The CPTU introduced e-GP in 2011 in order to conduct public procurement
more efficiently with enhanced transparency and accountability.
Upon inauguration of the e-GP portal hosted at www.eprocure.gov.bd by the
Prime Minister on June 2, 2011, tender through online was first invited on
August 23, 2011. On January 25, 2011 e-GP Guidelines was issued in line with
the Public Procurement Act-2006 and Public Procurement Rules-2008.
Operationalization of procurement law, rules, e-GP Guidelines and capacity
building of procuring entities and tenderers are the major agenda of a series
of reforms implemented by CPTU with the support of World Bank under the
Public Procurement Reform Project.
The reforms in public procurement started from 2002 with the establishment
of CPTU as a nodal office to regulate and monitor compliance with the law and
rules.
The e-GP system was rolled out in 2012 to four large agencies such as Local
Government Engineering Department (LGED), Bangladesh Rural Electrification
Board (BREB), Bangladesh Water Development Board (BWDB) and Roads and
Highways Department (RHD).
The agencies have implemented e-GP 100 percent up to the value of Taka 100
crore. Since 2012, e-GP growth started skyrocketing and it was implemented in
other government procuring agencies.
In all, e-GP coverage is 40 per cent of total volume of public procurement.
It is growing fast. In 2017, CPTU took up another project titled, “Digitizing
Implementation Monitoring and Public Procurement Project (DIMAPPP)” in
association with World Bank for full implementation of e-GP.
Asked about the future agenda of CPTU, Faruque said more reforms would be
implemented under DIMAPPP. In line with SDG target for public procurement,
steps will be taken to make it sustainable.
“The steps include framing a disposal policy considering the life cycle
costs of procurement, empowering CPTU with more autonomy, self-sufficiency of
e-GP system and digitization of project monitored by IMED,” said the CPTU DG.
Actions to achieve the SDG target of 12.7 are; i) procurement process using
e-GP and (ii) usage of PPR in public procurement. The lead division
responsible for this is IMED.
“On the procurement front by 2018, full coverage of procurement in e-GP up
to any value, introduction of intellectual and service procurement in e-GP,
international procurement, and contract management are high on agenda,” he
added.
Statistics showed up to December 2017, about 1200 out of a total of 1300
procuring agencies were connected to e-GP system. The number of tenderers
registered with the system is now about 41,000.
Up to December 2017 from 2011, more than 1.35 tenders were invited through
e-GP and their total value is over 1.24 lakh crore taka.
The e-GP system through tender document sales, registration and renewal has
so far earned Taka 219 crore. A total of 45 banks are also connected to e-GP
under MoUs as well as CPTU to collect payments both online and offline. For
e-GP support 24 hours Help Desk is introduced at CPTU and it is also
available at 16575.
There are a total of 60 national procurement trainers in the country. Steps
have been taken under DIMAPPP for further capacity building and
professionalization. Citizen engagement will also be forged for boosting
transparency.
The CPTU has made two innovations in the domain of public procurement. Such
innovations will help the stakeholders, especially the procuring entities and
tenderers. However, others concerned will also get benefit from such
innovative interventions.
Meanwhile, video tutorials to help procuring entities, tenderers, financial
institutions and others in the conduct of e-GP have been developed and
finalized for CPTU by Dohatec New Media. The innovative online tutorials have
20 separate modules in separate videos. Total duration of all the video
tutorials is one thousand minutes.
The CPTU has launched its new website (www.cptu.gov.bd) to upload of tender
notices. Earlier, PEs used to send their tender notices (non-eGP) and CPTU
would upload those on its website. But, now arrangement has been made and
system has been innovated for PEs to post their tender notices on the new
website by them.
Positive changes have been made after e-GP introduction. In 2007, about 15
per cent of the contract awards used to be made public whereas in e-GP system
100 per cent of the contracts are published on e-GP website.
About 70 percent of the tender notices were published in 2007 and in 2017;
it is 100 per cent in e-GP. In 2007, only 10 per cent of contract award
decisions were made within the initial tender validity period and in e-GP it
stood at 99.5 per cent in 2016.
The competition on an average per tender was only 4 in 2007 while in 2017;
it rose to 11 per tender in e-GP.
BSS/SPL/GM/GMR/1306 hrs