As many as 90% public procurement procedures successful – Progress made in suppressing irregularities and increasing efficiency

The director of the Public Procurement Office, Predrag Jovanovic, said for RTS that progress had been made in public procurement procedures and that there was an effort to reduce irregularities and increase the efficiency of the procedures.

He stated that considerable progress had been made in suppressing irregularities in public procurement procedures.

– As many as 90% of public procurement procedures have been successful, whereas 10% have been deemed unsuccessful due to irregularities – Jovanovic says and points out that progress has been made in making public procurement procedures more transparent as well.

– Four years age, non-transparent procedures made up 28% of the total number, whereas now they have been reduced to 3%. These are now mostly public procurement procedures and we are at the European average – Jovanovic notes.

Talking about recommendations by the European Commission, he explains that the key one pertains to suppressing the irregularity of procedures, as well as implementing the concept of the economically most acceptable offer.

– This means that not only the price should be taken into consideration in public procurement procedures, but also the quality and other criteria – he pointed out.

Jovanovic said that as many as 80% public procurement procedures in the EU took the quality into consideration, whereas, here, it was only the price that was considered in 84% of the cases.

Explaining the way the quality is to be estimated in public procurement procedures, Jovanovic says that the good practice of the EU member-states will be utilized.

– Their practice is for economists, doctors and engineers to be used in public procurement procedures. Depending on the object of the procedure, relevant experts are being consulted – Jovanovic noted.

According to him, Serbia has undertaken a number of measures in the past two years in order to increase the efficiency of the procedures. In 2014, an average procedure took 77 days to complete, and in 2016, the average duration has been 61 days.

– The idea is to make the procedure efficient, quick and as short as possible – Jovanovic concluded.

Uprava za javne nabavke Beograd

EUROPEAN COMMISSION Bruxelles

Public Procurement Office

Predrag Jovanovic

public procurement

European Commission

economically most acceptable offer