00:03 Good morning.
00:04 On behalf of
00:06 procurement for Development SCOP,
00:08 I invite
00:09 you to this event
00:11 on
00:12 public procurement,
00:13 legal and regulatory framework.
00:17 And procurement during emergencies
00:19 and lessons learned during
00:20 COVID-19.
00:23 And before the COP,
00:24 we would like to
00:26 thank
00:27 Hiba Vina,
00:28 the panelists,
00:29 keynote speakers,
00:30 Peter and Carrie,
00:32 and
00:34 discussant Belita and Io.
00:35 For joining this event.
00:37 Now
00:37 I request
00:39 Hiba
00:40 to start the event with a welcome.
00:41 Thank you.
00:45 Thank you,
00:45 Nagaraju.
00:46 Good morning.
00:47 Good afternoon.
00:48 Good evening,
00:49 everyone.
00:50 We're very excited to have you here today
00:53 with us to discuss this important uh session.
00:56 We have
00:57 a rich
01:00 uh partic experience from participants from different parts of the world.
01:04 And uh we would like to have this interactive discussion.
01:09 Manuela,
01:10 who is our moderator for this session,
01:12 will explain how the discussion will take place.
01:15 But first,
01:16 please allow me to welcome our keynote speaker,
01:20 Mr.
01:20 Peter Tripte.
01:22 He's a senior fellow in Public procurement law at the University of Nottingham
01:27 with
01:28 With huge and large experience.
01:30 For the interest of time,
01:32 I would only introduce the speakers and the panelists,
01:36 but their,
01:36 their bios are attached in the invitation
01:40 and I hope that you will all uh uh have a look at their bios after the meeting.
01:47 Uh,
01:47 with us also as a keynote speaker,
01:49 Ms.
01:50 Carrie Klutz.
01:51 Uh,
01:51 Ms.
01:52 Carrie Klutz is the head of the Country Programs,
01:55 Open Contracting
01:56 and Partnership.
01:58 And she will,
01:59 uh,
01:59 give us her experience on what transparency and what,
02:04 uh,
02:05 measures
02:06 can be done and can be,
02:08 uh,
02:08 required
02:09 during emergency operations and how
02:13 To ensure that what,
02:15 where the money is spent is known and where
02:19 the benefits have been attained.
02:21 I'm very pleased to
02:23 welcome
02:24 a few friends
02:26 from all over the world.
02:28 Mr.
02:28 Sahel Nang,
02:29 he is the Director General of Public Procurement in Senegal,
02:34 Ms.
02:34 Silvana Vallejo Paez,
02:36 Director General of Public Procurement in Ecuador.
02:41 Mr.
02:41 Abdus Sadeq Labdawi
02:43 from the min he's the ministerial treasurer of the Ministry
02:47 of Economic and Finance,
02:49 Ms.
02:50 Nugen
02:51 T
02:52 Tui Hang.
02:53 She's the deputy director
02:55 general of the Public procurement under Ministry of Planning.
02:59 And Claire,
03:01 Ms.
03:01 Claire Ifi,
03:03 Ili,
03:03 sorry,
03:04 she's in charge of the regulations and procurement and public procurement
03:09 and of the negotiation for France of European draft text relating
03:14 to public procurement.
03:16 We have esteemed,
03:17 very experienced uh uh panelists,
03:20 and I'm sure
03:22 we will learn and we will engage with them
03:25 to have the best out of this session.
03:28 The discussions are our Fearless Ladies of the World Bank,
03:32 Belita Menka,
03:33 she's a senior counsel from the World Bank.
03:37 uh Ms.
03:38 Ayo Akala,
03:40 Francesca
03:41 Ayodii Akala.
03:43 She's a practice manager for health and I can tell you,
03:46 she's one of the most busiest persons in the world right now.
03:50 Uh dealing with emergency all over Africa.
03:54 So welcome,
03:54 Ayo.
03:55 And finally,
03:57 our fearless moderator,
03:58 Manola Majo.
04:00 She's a procurement specialist
04:02 in,
04:02 in,
04:03 um,
04:03 in the,
04:04 in the Latin American region
04:06 of the World Bank.
04:09 These emergencies have put a lot of heads together to see how best to
04:16 respond,
04:16 how best to benefit those are affected.
04:19 The World Bank has
04:22 Been um
04:23 in many ways a leader in introducing
04:26 procedures and guidance on how to deal with emergencies,
04:30 whether it is
04:32 man-made emergencies,
04:34 natural emergencies that we have now,
04:36 which is global and I think in our lifetime,
04:39 this is the
04:40 uh the,
04:41 the severe,
04:43 the most severe uh emergency
04:46 that we have dealt with on a global level.
04:50 Or even a post war,
04:52 post-conflict.
04:54 So we have
04:55 procedures,
04:56 we have uh legal frameworks that we require in our operations.
05:02 But
05:03 the discussion today is how can we ensure
05:07 that the legal framework,
05:08 the procedures under emergency
05:11 can be
05:12 Really a driver to response,
05:15 can be really a driver to achieve results
05:18 and of course in a most transparent and in the most
05:22 uh um
05:24 effective way to the beneficiaries and to those who need it,
05:28 need it most.
05:29 We all understand that in emergencies,
05:32 chaos can come in
05:33 and chaos can open a lot of opportunities for
05:37 maybe misuse or leakages.
05:40 So we have our esteemed uh panelists and discussant to tell us
05:45 what could be done to minimize uh these,
05:48 uh these measures.
05:49 In the interest of time and because we want to hear from our
05:54 Um,
05:54 uh,
05:55 esteemed keynote speakers and then esteemed panelists.
05:59 I will stop here.
06:01 But last but not least,
06:02 I would like to introduce our our director,
06:06 Vinay Sharma.
06:08 He's the director of the,
06:09 uh,
06:10 he's the global director of procurement
06:12 in the World Bank and he oversees the procurement function
06:16 in implementation.
06:18 Welcome,
06:18 Vina,
06:19 please come in.
06:21 Thank you.
06:22 Uh,
06:22 I hope you're able to,
06:24 to hear me.
06:25 Uh,
06:26 thanks Nagaraja and Hiba for inviting me.
06:28 The topic being discussed is very timely,
06:31 and I'm happy that the community of practice has assembled this excellent panel.
06:35 To talk about the framework under
06:36 which public procurement operates under emergencies.
06:40 As you know,
06:41 COVID-19 crisis has left important lessons on governance
06:45 and enhanced collaboration on national,
06:48 regional
06:49 and international level,
06:51 as well as open and innovative ways to
06:53 promote dialogues between public and private stakeholders.
06:57 Public procurement
06:58 was and is a critical piece in the response from countries,
07:02 and it is fascinating to see the difference in responses by different countries.
07:07 Most countries use their established frameworks for emergency contracting,
07:11 ensuring the the necessary flexibility to respond to the extremely urgent needs,
07:17 but some
07:18 some countries developed additional guidance for this specific emergency.
07:22 We saw unprecedented conditions,
07:25 highlighted exposure of procurement systems to integrity risks,
07:28 and this is what Cuba was talking about.
07:31 Uh,
07:32 Perhaps not very surprisingly
07:34 that the reaction to transparency and accountability was unequal.
07:38 What was surprising was that while many
07:40 countries were affected by the crisis simultaneously,
07:43 we did not see coherent collaborative approaches.
07:47 Emergency situations generated conditions that encourage the improper use
07:51 of emergency funds and extraordinary budgets in some cases.
07:56 However,
07:58 to ensure the integrity of these
07:59 extraordinary resources for public purchasing and
08:01 contracting and the proper exercise of people's rights during the emergency,
08:06 many responsible governments increase transparency in the
08:08 use of open data through full,
08:10 continuous,
08:11 timely,
08:12 true,
08:12 and verifiable information
08:14 expressed in languages that could be understood by others.
08:17 Uh,
08:18 you,
08:19 you might perhaps know that the World Bank had carried out a study,
08:22 a survey of about 110 countries,
08:25 and we have found that the quality
08:27 of procurement systems actually had a direct bearing
08:31 on the health outcomes of different countries.
08:33 I am sure that the discussions today are going to enrich
08:38 our understanding of how,
08:40 how public procurement should
08:43 will
08:43 and can.
08:46 Help address emergencies in,
08:47 in countries.
08:49 Thank you very much for inviting me.
08:56 Many thanks Vinai for your opening remarks and
08:59 your continued support to our community of practice.
09:03 Now before going to our keynote speaker,
09:05 I would like to welcome all of you for joining us from all over the world.
09:10 Uh,
09:10 this event is organized by Community of Practice Procurement for Development,
09:13 and this event will take about 2 hours.
09:16 We are using a very innovative platform called Kudo,
09:19 and please
09:20 use your left side of the screen to,
09:23 uh,
09:23 channel through the language of your choice.
09:26 Uh,
09:26 we are also live streaming our event in,
09:28 uh,
09:28 uh,
09:29 other
09:30 social media and YouTube.
09:33 Um,
09:34 I will,
09:35 um,
09:35 ask all to have the the mic,
09:37 uh,
09:38 muted while you are not speaking and for
09:41 every one of you that is live connected,
09:42 please use the chat box to post your questions
09:45 and your comments to
09:47 our panelists.
09:52 Now,
09:52 uh,
09:52 let's move to our keynote speakers.
09:54 As Hiba introduced our first keynote speaker is Mr.
09:58 Peter Tripte.
09:59 He will share with us his academic perspective
10:02 on how to ensure compliance with core procurement principles
10:05 while procuring during state of emergency.
10:12 Thank you.
10:13 Thank you very much and thank you very much for inviting me to,
10:16 to this event,
10:17 which promises to be a really interesting one,
10:19 I think,
10:19 given the breadth of experience that we,
10:22 we have on the,
10:22 on the,
10:23 on the panel.
10:25 Um,
10:25 I've been asked to look,
10:26 I,
10:26 I,
10:27 uh,
10:27 Manola mentioned academic perspective.
10:29 I'm actually going to look at some of the,
10:31 the legal issues that I've been dealing with because I've been
10:33 helping some countries address some of the problems that have been raised
10:37 by the pandemic,
10:38 at least in terms of,
10:39 of procurement regulation.
10:41 And,
10:41 um,
10:42 I'd quite like it,
10:43 but it's,
10:43 it's much wider than,
10:44 than legal,
10:44 and I think that's one of the big problems that we're facing.
10:47 It's very easy to say,
10:48 oh,
10:49 get the lawyers to sort something out.
10:50 It,
10:50 it's not,
10:51 it's not that easy.
10:52 It doesn't work quite like that.
10:54 And I'm going to state the obvious at the beginning.
10:56 I mean,
10:57 the,
10:57 the,
10:57 the,
10:58 the people introducing the,
11:00 um,
11:00 the,
11:01 the,
11:01 the panel,
11:02 so Nagaraju and
11:03 uh Heva have already referred to it.
11:05 This is a pandemic without precedent.
11:07 I mean,
11:07 we haven't seen anything like this.
11:10 And of course it's caused legal problems,
11:12 but in all jurisdictions,
11:13 I mean,
11:14 uh,
11:14 in developed and in developing countries alike,
11:17 um,
11:18 yesterday,
11:18 I don't know if people have been following this,
11:20 but yesterday the National Audit Office in the United Kingdom,
11:23 the country that I'm from,
11:25 um.
11:26 Uh,
11:27 published a report,
11:28 uh,
11:28 which said that of the 18 billion pounds worth of contract,
11:31 that's almost $25
11:34 billion.24 something,
11:37 um,
11:37 most of those contracts were based on recommendations only
11:41 by ministers and different government advisors,
11:44 so there was no competitive procurement,
11:47 uh,
11:47 for that,
11:47 which is a pretty huge number that have failed to follow procurement rules,
11:51 and,
11:52 you know,
11:52 this is a,
11:53 Well,
11:54 it is a developed country,
11:55 but it's soon to become developing,
11:57 I think,
11:57 given it's decision to leave the European Union,
12:00 but that's a political statement.
12:02 And I'm sure Kerry will have something to say about this,
12:04 because the other thing that came out of this report
12:07 was that there were no records and no minutes of any meetings kept.
12:11 So everything was completely opaque
12:14 and non-transparent,
12:15 which of course means there was no possibility of verifying or even knowing.
12:20 Uh,
12:20 what happened.
12:21 So it's a pretty dreadful situation and the UK is
12:24 clearly not an example of how to do this,
12:26 um,
12:27 properly.
12:28 But I did say that it,
12:29 it's such an unusual situation.
12:31 I don't believe that any procurement system,
12:34 however well it's drafted,
12:35 however complete it is,
12:37 would be able to address all of the problems thrown up
12:40 by the pandemic.
12:42 Um,
12:42 and in,
12:43 and in some ways it's less a legal problem than a question of market failure.
12:47 There are huge problems of supply,
12:50 no supply of some product,
12:51 a lack of supply because we weren't ready for it of others,
12:55 but also of,
12:56 of countries leveraging their power and resources to stockpile,
13:00 um,
13:00 escalating prices,
13:01 not just a question of supply and demand,
13:03 but really unfair
13:05 and abusive pricing as well as fraudulent entrance,
13:08 uh,
13:08 which all leads to a higher risk of corruption,
13:11 and
13:11 there are lots of cases of contract non-performance.
13:14 So these are really.
13:16 Failures of the market,
13:17 uh,
13:17 an inability to address the problem and not really a legal issue.
13:20 I'm not trying to justify lawyers or excuse us
13:24 for having drafted bad regulations,
13:26 but I think it is way beyond just a legal question.
13:29 Although obviously that there are legal issues
13:32 um involved.
13:34 I think maybe one of the things that we could say also
13:37 is that
13:37 um
13:39 although the,
13:40 the initial problems do appear to be legal,
13:43 and of course,
13:44 where that's a problem of legislation,
13:45 we need to sort that out for the future,
13:48 um,
13:48 the scope and the severity of,
13:50 of the crisis means that there's much more that needs to be done.
13:53 There are very few emergencies on this scale,
13:56 but there are plenty of emergencies around and they are predictable.
14:00 Uh,
14:01 I'm thinking of things like the weather-based disasters,
14:03 hurricanes,
14:04 droughts,
14:04 floodings,
14:05 which I know a lot of the countries
14:07 that are participating on this panel,
14:09 uh,
14:09 will suffer.
14:10 Now we don't know when these are going to happen,
14:12 but we do know that they will happen and usually fairly regularly,
14:16 and we know what's needed.
14:17 They've happened before,
14:18 so we know what we need to deal with them.
14:20 And so the solution there is really to be prepared.
14:23 For those sorts of emergencies,
14:24 arguably,
14:25 we should have been prepared for this one,
14:27 scientists will tell us that
14:28 it was,
14:29 this was all completely foreseeable.
14:30 There was no,
14:31 not a surprise,
14:32 it's just the,
14:32 the timing was a surprise,
14:34 but it was going to happen.
14:36 So,
14:36 I think the best solution may well be that we should be prepared
14:39 and framework agreements,
14:41 which I know,
14:41 um,
14:42 I'm sure we'll be discussing at some point,
14:44 uh probably the best solution for dealing
14:47 with those sorts of predictable emergencies,
14:50 and that is to have available
14:52 a pool of suppliers and contractors at the ready so that when the emergency happens,
14:57 we're ready to deal with it.
14:58 We can do something about it
15:00 and not run around
15:01 uh trying to work out what,
15:03 what it is we can do.
15:06 Um,
15:07 now,
15:07 the,
15:08 what I've been asked to do is really to
15:10 talk about compliance with core principles of procurement regulation.
15:14 Um,
15:15 and even in an emergency,
15:16 of course,
15:17 we can
15:18 follow procurement rules.
15:19 The key is really to ensure compliance with
15:22 the procurement legislation that is in force,
15:24 and that's a question of how good that procurement legislation is.
15:28 But really,
15:28 the,
15:29 the first thing we should be doing is trying to apply
15:31 competitive procedures,
15:33 either the most transparent,
15:34 the most competitive procedures like open,
15:36 for example,
15:36 an open or a public
15:38 tender,
15:38 whenever that's possible,
15:40 um,
15:40 especially when the timelines can be met.
15:44 Because not every procurement in an emergency requires immediate action.
15:48 You may have to do something
15:50 that day or in the next few weeks.
15:52 But as we've seen from this pandemic,
15:54 we've been at it already sort of the best part of 9 months and it's going to carry on.
15:58 That's not an emergency in the sense of having to do something immediately,
16:02 that's a,
16:03 a longer term solution.
16:04 So in terms of procurement,
16:06 we have time
16:07 to plan and to do
16:09 things that we need to do.
16:10 It's not,
16:11 everything doesn't have to be done.
16:13 Uh,
16:13 immediately,
16:14 so I think there is,
16:15 uh,
16:15 an argument for saying that we should be able to apply
16:18 the procurement rules,
16:20 um,
16:21 as they are.
16:22 Um,
16:22 of course,
16:23 there are some problems that are built into procurement procedures.
16:28 Um,
16:29 for example,
16:29 and now those are things that perhaps is in
16:31 writing regulations or in encouraging different regulations we're responsible
16:36 for
16:36 placing.
16:37 We've put,
16:37 we've set up those obstacles.
16:39 Things like,
16:40 um,
16:41 waiting for bid securities to be,
16:44 uh,
16:44 to be received from banks and checking those bid securities.
16:48 I know Vina who spoke earlier.
16:50 Um,
16:50 has an issue with bid securities,
16:52 and,
16:52 and I think we all need it,
16:54 we have an issue with bid securities because,
16:56 uh,
16:56 are they really necessary in Europe,
16:58 we don't use them at all.
16:59 I mean,
16:59 when I'm teaching,
17:01 when I'm teaching procurement and I have to talk about bid securities,
17:04 most of my students from here say,
17:05 what are they?
17:06 We don't need them,
17:07 they're not necessary,
17:08 but of course,
17:09 a lot of countries do want them.
17:11 But for our current purposes,
17:12 they simply add delay and they cause a problem
17:16 for applying.
17:17 Um,
17:17 the normal procedures,
17:18 and I'm using the word normal in inverted commas,
17:21 approval mechanisms.
17:23 If you have to follow all of these procedures and get a number of different
17:27 approvals,
17:28 well,
17:28 you know,
17:28 if the people aren't available,
17:29 you're not going to get those approvals,
17:31 and that's a delay,
17:32 and that's built into the regulation
17:34 rather than,
17:35 um,
17:36 a,
17:36 a problem caused by,
17:38 uh,
17:38 the normal procurement,
17:39 um,
17:39 regulation.
17:41 And when we can't use competitive uh tendering,
17:43 when we can't use those,
17:44 those,
17:45 the most uh transparent procedures,
17:47 then the question is going to be
17:49 trying to maximize the use of
17:51 flexibility and speed under
17:53 the legislation and,
17:54 and all
17:55 procurement systems that I've seen do have some
17:58 um procedures there to deal with
18:00 emergency
18:02 situations.
18:02 It's usually some form of single source procurement or direct contracting.
18:06 It doesn't mean you have to go to one.
18:08 Uh,
18:08 bidder,
18:09 you can go to several,
18:10 but it's a direct,
18:11 um,
18:11 link,
18:12 a direct negotiation rather than advertising and,
18:14 and calling people in by invitation.
18:17 And that's quite normally,
18:19 quite normal in emergency situations.
18:21 All legislation does it and all countries need to have them.
18:24 Uh,
18:24 but some procurement systems,
18:26 and of course that's the result of the,
18:28 the approach of the government,
18:30 are so fearful of having direct contracting
18:33 that they make it very difficult and sometimes render it completely ineffective.
18:37 Uh,
18:37 and by that I mean using approval mechanisms,
18:40 checks and balances that are,
18:42 Uh,
18:42 probably,
18:43 uh,
18:43 too burdensome and then undermine totally the possibility of using,
18:48 uh,
18:48 speedy procedures,
18:49 and I think that's something that those responsible
18:51 for drafting legislation need to be aware of.
18:54 It's not,
18:55 it's not,
18:55 um,
18:56 inherent in procurement regulation itself.
18:59 So I think what I'd like to say is we really need to have a,
19:02 a balance of risk
19:03 and
19:04 outcomes
19:05 and that's in general,
19:06 not just in response to COVID.
19:07 I think it's become very obvious
19:09 in the case of COVID,
19:11 but
19:11 um I think in general we need to have the same,
19:14 the same sort of um approach.
19:18 Uh,
19:18 now some of the legal issues that I've been dealing with quite a lot really.
19:23 Uh,
19:23 go get,
19:24 go around the issue for triggering the emergency provisions.
19:27 How,
19:28 how and when can we use
19:30 these different emergency,
19:32 uh,
19:32 provisions?
19:33 In some cases it's a question of having an emergency declaration.
19:37 Uh,
19:38 these,
19:38 um,
19:39 appear in many,
19:40 in many country systems,
19:41 especially those who've
19:43 have,
19:43 have recently reformed their systems.
19:46 But it also
19:47 applies in developed countries like the United States.
19:50 Now,
19:50 in the US there are plenty of
19:52 other provisions which will trigger emergency provisions,
19:55 but there is one,
19:57 which,
19:58 uh,
19:58 which allows certain,
19:59 um,
19:59 payments to be made,
20:01 which is triggered by an emergency declaration.
20:04 The trouble with waiting for an emergency
20:06 declaration is really a question of delay.
20:09 In the United States,
20:10 uh,
20:11 the president happens to be Trump,
20:12 of course,
20:13 but the president waited rather a long time before issuing a declaration.
20:17 His declaration of emergency came 20 days after the
20:20 World Health Organization decided to declare an emergency.
20:24 Not so long you may say,
20:25 but in those countries where you,
20:27 you can
20:28 use shorter time periods in the case of urgency,
20:31 you could easily do a full competitive procedure using accelerated
20:35 timelines within those 20 days.
20:37 So
20:37 I think that's quite a significant delay
20:40 in terms of um declaring an emergency.
20:43 They're very discretionary because they,
20:45 they're often the conditions are not very clear
20:47 in
20:48 the legislation,
20:49 so it's really up to the president or his advisors to say when that should happen.
20:53 And the other problem with the declaration of
20:55 emergency is really the length of validity.
20:58 Um,
20:59 the,
20:59 in the US,
20:59 for example,
21:00 I,
21:00 I,
21:00 I,
21:01 uh,
21:01 the US is not so bad.
21:02 I'm just using an example because in this case,
21:04 it,
21:04 it's quite a,
21:05 a,
21:06 a difficult,
21:06 um,
21:07 or it raises a bit of a problem.
21:09 In the US,
21:10 the declara,
21:10 the president's declaration of emergency lasts for one year,
21:13 it's valid for one year.
21:15 So even if it's,
21:16 if it's um an urgency that some,
21:18 some critical
21:19 um issue that,
21:20 that,
21:21 that led to the declaration,
21:22 it lasts for a year,
21:23 so the urgency's been and gone by the time
21:26 the procurement is done,
21:27 so that really doesn't reflect the need.
21:30 Another method
21:31 um that,
21:32 that is used in different countries depends on the existence of immediacy.
21:37 So,
21:37 um,
21:38 if,
21:38 if there isn't enough time,
21:40 if there is insufficient time to use the competitive
21:43 procedures,
21:43 then that's the time at which you can use the more flexible procedures.
21:47 And in theory that allows
21:49 the procuring entity to take action when it recognizes
21:53 the urgency.
21:55 Um,
21:57 That,
21:57 um,
21:58 so it's based on,
21:58 on the fact that there isn't enough time,
22:00 but there are usually conditions as well.
22:02 So
22:03 conditions that the,
22:04 the,
22:04 um,
22:05 emergency shouldn't have been foreseeable and shouldn't be,
22:08 um,
22:08 the result of any dilatory conduct on the part of the procuring entity.
22:12 And this,
22:13 this is sort of problematic and has been in,
22:15 in,
22:16 in the legislation that I've been looking at.
22:18 Because even if the pandemic wasn't foreseeable,
22:21 and
22:21 the scientists may disagree on that,
22:23 once it's happened,
22:25 the consequences of that pandemic become foreseeable.
22:28 So we know what needs to happen over a period of time,
22:30 it's no longer urgent
22:32 and therefore it might,
22:33 the,
22:34 the procurement might fall outside these definitions of urgency.
22:38 And if there's any delay in addressing dilatory conduct,
22:41 so for example,
22:43 uh sorry,
22:43 any delay in taking action if there is dilatory conduct,
22:46 so for example,
22:47 there wasn't budget available or people couldn't agree
22:49 on what to do or we were waiting for approval,
22:52 that takes away the foresee the unforeseeability and it's no longer urgent.
22:56 So
22:57 the whole
22:58 trigger for using urgent and flexible procedures disappears.
23:02 And there are of course then
23:04 definitions of urgency,
23:06 we can have different degrees,
23:07 so they say if it's very urgent,
23:08 you can do it immediately.
23:10 If it's less urgent but still urgent,
23:12 then you can do
23:13 a a little bit longer.
23:14 You don't do direct,
23:15 it's direct solicitation,
23:16 you take a little bit more time and it's almost like a competitive procedure.
23:21 Um,
23:21 but that causes a problem,
23:22 I think in reality,
23:24 because what
23:25 procuring entities need or procurement officers need when we
23:28 have an urgency is some sort of certainty.
23:30 What can I do at this point in time?
23:32 They don't need,
23:33 um,
23:33 tools of statutory interpretation,
23:35 well,
23:36 guidelines who say this is how you interpret this provision,
23:38 that's,
23:39 no,
23:39 they just need to know what they can do,
23:40 and I think that's,
23:42 that's turned out to be something of,
23:44 um,
23:44 a problem in,
23:46 in practice.
23:48 Now the real issue is always going to be one of,
23:50 of question,
23:51 is always going to be one of time and speed.
23:54 Um,
23:54 now,
23:54 normally,
23:55 the distinction is made,
23:57 uh,
23:57 based on bidding periods.
23:59 There's time for submission of bids.
24:00 So if that's too long,
24:01 um,
24:02 then we're not going to be able to deal with something urgently,
24:04 those need to be shorter.
24:06 But it's not just a question of,
24:08 of,
24:08 of bid submission timing.
24:11 Time can also be lost through lots of other,
24:13 uh,
24:14 provisions.
24:14 So,
24:15 you always have to
24:16 prepare technical specifications.
24:18 I mean,
24:18 you can't get rid of that as a requirement.
24:20 You can't just buy something.
24:22 Um,
24:23 without knowing what you're buying.
24:24 Of course,
24:25 that's exactly what the UK did,
24:27 and,
24:27 you know,
24:28 they turned to a producer of vacuum cleaners to
24:31 produce all of the equipment that they needed,
24:33 Dyson.
24:34 Um,
24:34 so they didn't really know what they were doing,
24:35 and that led to a pretty much a failure in,
24:38 in the procurement.
24:39 But there are other things like the bid securities I've mentioned,
24:41 you have to have you,
24:42 you need clarifications maybe
24:44 um there are bid opening procedures which are always get in the way.
24:48 There's time for evaluation,
24:49 award procedures and approvals.
24:51 All of these things cause
24:52 a,
24:52 a delay and I think that's where
24:55 we need to,
24:55 to,
24:56 that's what we need to look at.
24:57 Um,
24:58 because procurement legislation as it stands is pretty much a blunt instrument to,
25:02 to address these issues.
25:04 In practice,
25:04 what I've seen in most countries,
25:06 and I've helped draft some of this a special guidance to,
25:09 um,
25:09 tell procuring entities what it is they can and can't do.
25:13 Um,
25:14 now
25:15 that's because maybe the,
25:16 the legislation isn't.
25:18 Isn't clear enough,
25:19 but it's legislation,
25:20 we don't write every detail in legislation,
25:23 so you need,
25:24 you need somehow to have some capacity to understand all of this,
25:27 so it may be a question of capacity,
25:29 of course,
25:30 but this guidance has been necessary to spell out the core principles.
25:34 Now in some cases,
25:35 that's indicated shortcomings in the law,
25:38 and those,
25:38 like I've mentioned,
25:39 description of urgency and that of course needs to be
25:42 amended for the future.
25:44 But dealing with all of these guidelines,
25:46 the irony of that,
25:46 all of that really is that by the time the
25:48 guidance has been prepared and gone through several iterations,
25:51 the emergency is over.
25:53 I don't mean the pandemic,
25:54 I mean the urgent
25:55 element of the pandemic,
25:57 that's finished and,
25:58 and really there's no,
25:59 uh,
26:00 you know,
26:00 there's nothing left to do.
26:02 So just finally,
26:03 I,
26:03 I think perhaps I should say we really need to prepare for the next time
26:07 in the hope of course that there's never going to be a next time,
26:09 or at least not quite like this.
26:11 So I'd suggest that we start looking at having
26:13 frameworks in place to deal with predictable emergencies,
26:16 and as I said,
26:17 scientists will say that
26:19 this was foreseeable,
26:20 we were ill prepared and we should have been
26:22 ready for it,
26:23 even if we didn't believe that,
26:24 so we need to get ready for more.
26:26 We need to clarify
26:28 the laws to trigger flexible procedures quickly and simply,
26:31 so
26:32 if it's a declaration,
26:33 let's get that right,
26:34 if it's a definition,
26:35 let's get that right.
26:36 I think we should remove obstacles which do not add value,
26:40 so bid securities,
26:41 why do we need those?
26:42 We can at least replace them by
26:44 bid securing declarations,
26:46 which
26:47 also take time but are much quicker and,
26:48 and simpler and cheaper.
26:51 Maybe we should consider getting rid of approvals where they don't add value,
26:54 so we could strengthen
26:55 uh complaint mechanism to deal with cases where there are problems.
27:00 Maybe we need a manual in place rather than guidance,
27:03 but constant manuals so that we can have lessons learned.
27:07 And I think we probably need to be ready,
27:09 more ready to address
27:10 market failures,
27:12 and procurement bodies are really not renowned for doing this.
27:15 So we should be applying competition rules,
27:17 we should be applying anti-corruption provisions,
27:19 so fraudulent conduct,
27:22 abusive market behavior and profiteering,
27:24 also something that came up in the
27:26 National Audit Office report that I mentioned.
27:29 And as VA said at the very beginning,
27:31 Uh,
27:32 maybe we should look more at cooperative procurement so that
27:35 countries are not working in isolation.
27:37 This might reduce abusive market behavior and ultimately
27:41 might ensure a bit more equity in the distribution of the products and services
27:46 that we need.
27:47 Now,
27:47 there's much more,
27:48 of course,
27:48 to discuss,
27:49 um,
27:50 and I'm looking forward very much to the presentations to come,
27:53 but I really need to stop at this point because I think I've gone over time.
27:56 Thank you very much.
27:59 Well,
27:59 uh,
28:00 thank you,
28:00 thank you very much,
28:01 Mr.
28:01 Tere for your insight.
28:03 Interesting view on procurement driven by immediacy and
28:06 also considering the situation caused by the pandemic,
28:10 more of a question of market failure,
28:12 and I'm pretty sure our
28:14 legal colleague Belita is very happy with your initial
28:16 remarks on how this is not a legal issue,
28:19 so.
28:21 Now we can move
28:23 to our
28:25 second speaker,
28:26 Mrs.
28:26 Carrie Klotz.
28:27 We invite her to share her take on
28:30 open procurement data to analyze and share information
28:33 to predict and manage critical supply chain.
28:36 Ms.
28:36 Klotz,
28:37 the floor is yours.
28:42 Great.
28:42 Thank you
28:43 so much and,
28:44 and thanks so much for inviting me,
28:46 um,
28:46 Nagaraji and Hiba in particular.
28:48 Um,
28:48 I'm really excited to be here with some familiar faces and to,
28:52 to meet some new,
28:53 um,
28:53 folks as well.
28:55 Um,
28:55 and I think mostly I'm,
28:56 I'm impressed to see that there's still this much interest in this topic even
29:00 six months in,
29:01 unfortunately,
29:01 and,
29:02 and hopefully the end is in sight.
29:03 Um,
29:04 but I think as we know now more than ever,
29:06 procurement is key to both an effective crisis response,
29:09 of course,
29:10 perhaps more importantly,
29:11 an effective recovery.
29:12 Um,
29:13 so when the COVID-19 pandemic hit earlier this year,
29:15 it didn't take long to realize,
29:17 and Peter pointed out some of this,
29:19 um,
29:19 how unprepared most procurement systems were to deal with the emergency.
29:23 Um,
29:23 and of course,
29:24 significant concerns were raised and continue to
29:26 be about the potential for inefficiency,
29:28 ineffectiveness,
29:29 and abuse during the pandemic response.
29:32 As we know all too well now,
29:34 COVID put the world in crisis mode or chaos as HIPA mentioned.
29:37 Um,
29:38 and governments in all levels were mobilized to purchase urgently needed
29:41 medical equipment and other supplies and services to fight the virus.
29:44 Um,
29:45 we know now that governments spent at least $100 billion on
29:47 COVID contracts in just the 1st 4 months of the pandemic,
29:50 and that continues to go.
29:52 Um,
29:53 I can cue the slides,
29:54 no worries.
29:55 Um,
29:55 unfortunately,
29:56 in many cases,
29:57 we also saw a Hunger Games scenario,
29:58 which is chaos,
30:00 uh,
30:00 where governments were directly competing against each other for limited amounts
30:04 of equipment and supplies.
30:05 Not to mention that procurement agencies might not have known.
30:08 What they needed to buy in the first place.
30:10 And,
30:11 of course,
30:11 the bad actors taking advantage of the chaos to
30:13 enrich themselves at the expense of medical patients.
30:16 And that's what this slide is getting at.
30:18 Um,
30:19 so COVID really put procurement into the spotlight like never before.
30:23 And we've all seen the stream of media reports of COVID gone wrong,
30:26 and especially this report that Peter mentioned that
30:28 came out yesterday in the UK that is,
30:30 um,
30:31 Uh,
30:31 not,
30:32 not so,
30:33 not so positive.
30:34 Um,
30:34 but across the world,
30:35 millions upon millions of dollars have
30:37 been squandered on questionable purchases.
30:40 Um,
30:40 we've seen ventilators that never arrived in Israel,
30:42 counterfeit masks and test tubes that turned out to be soda bottles in the US,
30:46 and this is an example of a raspberry farm that
30:48 scored a $6 million contract to supply ventilators in Bosnia.
30:53 Beyond that,
30:53 there's also the devastating economic impact of the COVID pandemic,
30:56 which we all know too well.
30:58 Um,
30:58 the bank itself,
30:59 I think we know,
31:00 has warned that the current crisis could undo decades of global poverty reduction.
31:05 So the huge economic economy that's smarter,
31:07 more efficient government spending is more important than ever before.
31:11 So what can we do?
31:13 As the IMF managing director,
31:14 Georgieva said,
31:15 back at the very beginning of the crisis,
31:17 governments need to spend more money
31:19 more quickly,
31:20 but keep the receipts.
31:22 At the Open Contracting Partnership,
31:24 we couldn't agree more.
31:25 For those who don't know us,
31:26 we spun out of the bank's governance global practice about 5 years ago,
31:30 and we now work with governments around the world and their stakeholders
31:33 to implement data-driven reform projects
31:36 to improve the effectiveness and fairness of government contracting,
31:39 and we often work in coordination with bank projects.
31:42 At its core,
31:43 open contracting is about publishing and using.
31:46 Carrie,
31:47 sorry to interrupt.
31:48 I would kindly ask you to speak a little bit slower
31:51 so our interpreters can,
31:52 uh,
31:53 do their work while online.
31:54 Thank you.
31:57 Sure.
31:58 Of course.
32:01 So open contracting is about publishing
32:03 and using
32:04 open,
32:05 accessible,
32:06 timely information on government contracting
32:09 to engage citizens and business in identifying and fixing problems.
32:13 We look at the entire chain of public contracting,
32:17 including planning,
32:18 tendering,
32:18 awards,
32:19 and implementation
32:21 through to the delivery.
32:23 Our work with partners around the world has shown that open
32:26 contracting can make a big difference when it's done right.
32:30 By that,
32:30 I mean beyond legal frameworks alone.
32:32 As Peter rightly mentioned,
32:34 the high-putty,
32:35 open data that's accessible.
32:37 Businesses and citizens need to have a voice and government has an ear to listen.
32:41 Open contracting has led to significant savings
32:44 and improved citizens
32:45 services,
32:46 and ultimately rebuilt trust.
32:49 So what we've seen over the past few months
32:51 is countries doing just this have been able to respond better to the crisis.
32:55 The pandemic has actually demonstrated the vision of open contracting.
32:59 And we've seen clearly that countries investing in open contracting data
33:03 and working with civil society and business for planning and monitoring
33:06 have seen better results.
33:08 Then the next slide.
33:11 Um,
33:14 Perhaps most importantly,
33:15 in order to prepare better in the long term
33:17 for the recovery we all hope is coming soon.
33:20 We've developed some recommendations based on our work
33:22 with partners over the past several months.
33:25 First,
33:26 on policy.
33:27 Encourage our client countries to ensure open emergency procurement
33:31 that makes data and information
33:33 awards public.
33:35 Help to make emergency procedures and procurement
33:38 transparent and public and clearly justified,
33:41 as Peter highlighted well.
33:43 2,
33:44 coordination and oversight.
33:47 Centralized and coordinated procurement
33:49 can help with quick and better planning.
33:52 Help your client countries set goals and priorities,
33:54 and consolidate emergency committees
33:57 for quick decision making.
34:00 3.
34:01 Disclosure and open data.
34:04 We can recommend that client governments publish and use
34:07 open data on emergency procurement
34:09 in order to analyze and share information,
34:12 to predict demand,
34:14 understand the market,
34:15 and manage critical health supply chains.
34:19 It's key to ensure safeguards and full
34:21 transparency in bank-funded projects as well,
34:24 to be able to track and monitor procurement,
34:26 including related to the rapid credit facilities that are ongoing.
34:29 We're happy to provide advice and guidance on what this could look like
34:33 with a reminder that you can still buy fast
34:35 but keep the receipts.
34:38 For those client countries that are still working toward digital procurement,
34:41 disclosing information to the extent possible
34:44 is still crucial for building trust with citizens.
34:48 Number 4,
34:49 in terms of red flags analysis and supplier insights,
34:52 especially given the huge supply shock during the emergency,
34:56 there's a clear need to help buyers find suppliers,
34:59 but also a need to do due diligence on them
35:01 and understand track records,
35:03 as many of the recent news stories have made apparent,
35:06 including some that Peter mentioned
35:07 and our raspberry farmers from earlier.
35:10 Last but not least,
35:12 collaboration with civil society,
35:14 journalists,
35:15 and other stakeholders for monitoring is key.
35:18 We can encourage and support partnerships among civil society,
35:21 audit institutions,
35:23 media,
35:24 and procurement authorities
35:26 to monitor effective spending and delivery of goods and services.
35:30 In many countries,
35:31 such monitoring and advocacy has already led to more transparency,
35:35 accountability,
35:35 and effectiveness,
35:36 as we'll see now.
35:40 We're working in various capacities with all the countries
35:42 that we'll hear from on our panel to come.
35:45 Uh,
35:45 so I'll give a cour demon of a couple of additional examples from Paraguay,
35:49 Moldova,
35:50 and Nigeria,
35:51 which are different ways
35:52 how open contracting allowed them to better plan,
35:55 buy,
35:55 and deliver
35:56 essential COVID contracts.
35:59 In Paraguay,
35:59 as you see here,
36:00 the government's procurement agency wanted to ensure
36:03 transparency of its COVID-19 emergency purchases.
36:07 So we worked with our partners there to
36:09 ensure accurate identification and publication of this information
36:13 within 10 days of purchase.
36:15 Data included the buyers,
36:17 prices,
36:18 suppliers,
36:19 and information about the items being purchased,
36:22 as well as their delivery.
36:25 They've also published a searchable data set
36:27 of COVID-19 procurement as you see here.
36:29 And the open contracting approach is also enabling more agile procurement
36:33 as they were able to create a registry of suppliers of emergency items
36:37 that makes it easier for government agencies to act or respond
36:41 and frameworks to make it easier
36:43 to procure these items.
36:45 They've also worked to ensure that
36:46 the public could easily monitor COVID-19 purchases
36:50 by establishing a dedicated searchable webpage,
36:52 as well as a dashboard and mobile app
36:55 that sends notifications of newly awarded contracts.
36:58 We've already seen users of this data include government itself,
37:01 business,
37:02 civil society,
37:03 academia,
37:05 and media
37:06 who have actually been reporting on irregular procurements,
37:08 including a case where volumes of tonic water
37:11 were purchased at 5 times the normal price
37:14 as an alleged COVID-19 treatment.
37:16 This led the procurement authority to introduce new rules
37:19 for reference prices on emergency purchase to be published,
37:22 which hopefully will avoid other inflated emergency procurements
37:26 now and in the future.
37:29 Over the oceans in Moldova,
37:30 Positive Initiative is the largest patient rights advocacy group in the country.
37:34 It's also part of our Lyft Impact Accelerator program.
37:38 There,
37:38 they built a coalition of 30 nonprofit and governmental organizations
37:42 that in just a few weeks,
37:44 launched a public procurement platform
37:46 that displays detailed information about all government contracts
37:49 for supplies and services to fight COVID.
37:52 This has benefited a range of stakeholders
37:55 as we've seen journalists running investigations,
37:58 civil society tracking spending,
38:00 procuring entities using the tools for better planning,
38:03 and suppliers conducting market analysis.
38:07 And down in Nigeria,
38:08 related to the government's commitment to
38:10 the IMF's rapid Credit facility funding,
38:13 the procurement Authority has begun publishing information on COVID procurement
38:16 through the Nigerian Open Contracting portal.
38:19 This enabled a coalition of civil society organizations
38:22 to use this data for advocacy and monitoring.
38:25 The information is only available in PDF for the time being,
38:28 but it's already led to an increase in coverage of information published,
38:32 and discussions are ongoing to publish this information in a more usable
38:36 and open format
38:37 for COVID procurement and beyond.
38:39 And this includes looking toward the new bank-supported EGP system.
38:44 In the slide here,
38:45 um,
38:46 you see,
38:47 actually right now,
38:48 uh,
38:48 is,
38:49 is happening the launch of our recent action research project
38:52 where we worked with teams from 12 countries around the world
38:55 to analyze emergency procurement and
38:57 make recommendations to improve efficiency,
38:59 effectiveness,
39:00 fairness,
39:01 integrity,
39:02 and equity.
39:03 There were a range of challenges that are highlighted on this slide,
39:06 but one recurring theme that echoes many of the lessons previously cited,
39:10 as well as our upcoming
39:12 comparative legal research that we're doing with
39:13 Thomson Reuter Foundation's Trust Law Project.
39:16 But we've seen that good policies with solid legal frameworks
39:19 and especially standardized,
39:21 timely,
39:22 good quality data publication
39:24 has enabled the best analysis.
39:27 We have a couple of upcoming um
39:30 sets of research that will announce a call for proposals on.
39:33 Uh,
39:33 the first one,
39:34 especially looking at how open contracting approaches can support effective
39:37 and efficient spending during the recovery
39:40 from the impacts of COVID-19.
39:42 Um,
39:42 we'll also be doing a bit of research looking specifically at,
39:45 uh,
39:45 the commitments around the IMF rapid Credit Facility,
39:48 um,
39:48 and the pledges that countries have made to
39:51 Published tracks.
39:52 We'd love to collaborate with you all on that.
39:55 The next slide,
39:57 you can see
39:58 how we've worked over the past months to write up a series of best practices,
40:02 as well as developing resources to support
40:04 country partners to respond to the pandemic.
40:07 Here you see our guide to
40:08 collecting and publishing COVID-19 procurement information,
40:11 which we know is already being used by our partners in Argentina,
40:15 Ecuador,
40:16 South Africa,
40:16 and.
40:18 The COVID-19 page on our website links to this and many additional
40:21 resources that can be useful to you and your client countries.
40:25 From mapping COVID-19 data to the OCDS
40:28 to tips for publishing relevant information,
40:30 to red flags indicators,
40:32 to supporting use,
40:33 analysis and monitoring of data.
40:36 We also always offer our OCDS helpdesk,
40:39 a free of charge bespoke service for
40:41 those working to publish open contracting data.
40:44 And we're especially excited about a new tool that
40:46 will launch next month with Transparency International's Health Initiative,
40:50 our COVID procurement Explorer,
40:52 which will be a platform to collect
40:54 COVID-19 procurement information,
40:56 as well as lessons learned and best practices from all around the world.
41:00 We're piloting initially with 5 countries from Latan,
41:03 ECA,
41:03 and Africa,
41:04 but we're keen to work with others to expand coverage far and beyond,
41:07 far and wide beyond us.
41:10 And looking beyond the crisis response itself and toward the eventual recovery,
41:14 we're especially excited about the vaccines that they're promising this week.
41:18 As the vaccine comes closer to reality,
41:21 we'll be working with several of our partners
41:22 to develop a COVID vaccine procurement tracker.
41:25 This would include data on budgets,
41:28 info about how the vaccines will be purchased and processes followed,
41:31 and we also hope to support our partners on
41:33 delivery and quality of the vaccines as well,
41:36 looking toward equitable distribution.
41:38 We know that challenges will continue during the recovery phase,
41:41 and we're especially focused on the crucial sectors of health,
41:44 infrastructure,
41:45 and small and medium-sized prizes.
41:48 So we know many governments focus on these areas
41:50 as the crisis transitions from emergency response to longer-term recovery.
41:55 The bank and international partners can of course help support governments to
41:59 be set up for success during this next phase as well.
42:02 Again,
42:02 the key things to consider in an effective emergency response
42:05 and recovery
42:07 are the right policies that allow for transparency,
42:10 good quality,
42:11 accessible open data,
42:13 coordination of demand and response among different actors,
42:16 and data use and monitoring.
42:18 The good news is that you don't have to reinvent the wheel over and over again.
42:22 We have global resources like the Open Contracting Data Standard,
42:25 related tools and methodologies,
42:28 proven tactics and templates for designing reforms,
42:30 as well as change management process to go along with them.
42:33 And other resources created by the open contracting community
42:36 adopted and used by your client.
42:40 One thing that's for sure,
42:42 the fiscal impact of COVID-19 will be unprecedented.
42:46 We want to make the most of what limited public money there is
42:49 to effectively fight the virus,
42:50 protect our populations,
42:52 and rebuild our economies.
42:53 We've seen that open data and transparency need to be at the heart of the response,
42:57 as well as the plans to build back better.
43:00 And if anyone's interested in how to get started,
43:02 please don't hesitate to get in touch.
43:04 We're planning a follow-up events,
43:05 um,
43:06 hopefully next month to speak more about systemic forums to help the longer term,
43:09 looking toward the recovery too.
43:11 I'll stop there.
43:12 Thank you.
43:14 Well,
43:15 many thanks Carrie,
43:15 for sharing your perspective on the importance of clear and transparent data that
43:20 resonates so much with our work
43:22 and indeed the emergency put procurement in,
43:24 in the spotlight as never before.
43:26 I'm certain that the presentation from our keynote
43:29 speaker provoked questions and reaction from our audience.
43:32 I see a lot of questions coming throughout TED,
43:35 and I will,
43:36 I will encourage our audience to please,
43:38 uh,
43:39 continue with,
43:40 uh,
43:40 placing your questions,
43:41 your comments in the TED in the end of the session.
43:44 We will give a voice to all of you.
43:46 Now,
43:47 uh,
43:47 we would like to open the floor to
43:48 our panelists and we listen country's firsthand experience.
43:53 To all of our panelists,
43:55 we would like to hear your views
43:57 uh on how being in the middle of the pandemic,
44:00 uh.
44:02 Affected your work?
44:03 How is your experience with uh procurement under state
44:06 of emergency and with what all what it entails?
44:10 Can you please
44:11 share with us today
44:12 your country readiness to conduct,
44:14 to conduct emergency procurement,
44:16 available rules and regulation,
44:18 practices in place,
44:20 instruments or electronic platforms?
44:23 What kind of measures were taken to respond to any policy or procedure gap.
44:28 And finally,
44:28 please share with us what worked well
44:31 and what needed improvement or kind of a lesson learned.
44:34 We will hear from each of the countries like a 10 minute brief discussion,
44:38 and we will start
44:39 with the experience of France that Ms.
44:42 Ily will kindly share with us.
44:44 Ms.
44:44 Ili,
44:45 the floor is yours.
44:57 Miss
45:08 Can you hear us?
45:11 With mode.
45:13 Yes,
45:13 I can hear you.
45:14 Can you hear me?
45:18 Can you hear me?
45:22 Great.
45:25 Hello,
45:26 everyone.
45:27 Thank you.
45:29 Very much for giving me the floor.
45:31 I am very pleased to speak about
45:34 this topic with you today.
45:38 My
45:39 name is Claire Ely.
45:41 I am a legal expert on
45:44 Public procurement for the Ministry of the Economy and Finance.
45:48 If I'm speaking too fast,
45:50 please do let me know.
45:53 So that the interpreters can follow along.
45:57 Now,
45:58 in the case of France.
46:02 We were
46:03 very much affected by COVID,
46:05 as you know.
46:09 About 46,000 people have died to date,
46:12 unfortunately.
46:15 Starting in March of this year,
46:17 we had to take very drastic measures to fight COVID.
46:22 The main problem
46:26 That we encountered.
46:30 Were problems related to supply.
46:34 At the beginning of the pandemic.
46:39 And even before in February and going into March.
46:44 We saw situations.
46:48 That were extremely surprising,
46:50 especially when we looked at the
46:52 markets and the value chains.
47:01 We saw
47:03 a lot of cases where buyers.
47:06 Bought up
47:08 Masks or.
47:11 Medicine and the goods weren't actually
47:15 delivered.
47:17 Because
47:18 when.
47:19 The goods arrived at the airport.
47:21 Other countries,
47:22 particularly the United States,
47:24 rushed in
47:25 and took.
47:28 Those masks.
47:29 And originally,
47:29 those masks were supposed to go to some of the French overseas territories.
47:35 So all of that to say where that we were in a situation
47:39 where it was very difficult to
47:43 uphold our principles.
47:45 And sometimes it was hard not to play that kind of game.
47:51 So,
47:57 We wanted to.
47:59 Get those goods back from the US government
48:02 because we needed those materials as well.
48:07 I'll also note here that
48:09 France has very strict regulations on public procurement.
48:15 Of course,
48:16 European law also applies to us,
48:19 but we go above and beyond European thresholds for procurement in France.
48:28 And our
48:29 public procurement principles are very strict.
48:34 Uh,
48:34 we emphasize transparency
48:36 and
48:38 that
48:38 is the case for all situations,
48:41 all cases of procurement.
48:44 But that made things very complicated for us.
48:49 Again,
48:49 as I said,
48:50 it was very hard not to,
48:52 to get into that game of
48:54 paying more in order to get the merchandise or equipment that we needed.
48:59 And we also know that some companies
49:02 took advantage of that situation.
49:07 So what did France do?
49:09 France had to urgently adapt some of its procurement rules.
49:16 The most important thing for us,
49:18 which I would note here.
49:22 is for us to strike a balance.
49:26 Between
49:29 Flexibility
49:31 on the one hand and upholding and applying our principles on the other hand.
49:36 So we had to adapt our regulations.
49:41 A
49:44 Regulation was passed in March to make those changes.
49:48 I'll summarize them here.
49:51 Our main goal was to say that.
49:54 This is only a temporary
49:56 reform or modification of our laws.
49:59 And
50:00 buyers
50:01 could enjoy some flexibility,
50:03 but not in a systematic manner,
50:05 not in every single case necessarily.
50:08 So,
50:09 if flexibility was offered to a buyer,
50:13 The buyer couldn't come back later and say.
50:18 Well,
50:20 This contract holds for the duration of the emergency or the pandemic.
50:27 The buyer would have to.
50:30 Make sure that the flexibility would continue to apply
50:34 to each contract that he was engaged in.
50:43 So it was very important for us,
50:45 I'm
50:46 repeating this again,
50:47 to make sure
50:49 that we were not
50:51 contravening our own public procurement laws.
50:53 We needed to make sure that public procurement law
50:57 was
50:59 A way to protect us in the situation.
51:03 And not the contrary.
51:06 Starting in March of this year,
51:08 France
51:09 took a few different measures
51:12 to
51:13 facilitate the situation for buyers.
51:16 And also to support
51:18 various businesses and companies during the crisis.
51:22 So to help
51:23 buyers,
51:24 we
51:26 Offered a few
51:29 new arrangements.
51:31 Particularly,
51:32 we decided to.
51:35 Modify.
51:37 Uh,
51:37 the deadlines for receiving
51:41 bids.
51:47 What we decided to do.
51:49 Was have a longer period during which we could receive
51:54 these submissions.
51:57 When you try to
51:59 do something quickly,
52:00 often the deadlines are very tight and very short,
52:03 and we weren't getting any responses because those deadlines were too tight.
52:07 And so we'd have to start the whole process over again.
52:10 And a lot of companies,
52:12 particularly French companies,
52:13 came back to us and said,
52:16 It would make things a lot easier
52:18 if we had longer time frames to respond to these calls for tender.
52:24 That would give everyone more of an opportunity
52:26 to prepare themselves and send in a bid.
52:28 And that really was a way to
52:31 address the
52:33 emergency was to allow for a longer submission period.
52:43 Again,
52:43 it was up to the buyer.
52:47 To
52:50 Send in the.
52:52 The bid
53:01 Now,
53:03 We also looked at other.
53:07 Uh,
53:07 instances of procurement.
53:12 We
53:13 Wanted
53:16 To continue to have open
53:19 contracts as much as possible.
53:24 But we did allow for
53:26 negotiations to take place
53:28 by video conference even though that wasn't something
53:31 that was originally provided for in the law.
53:34 There was enough flexibility for those conversations to take place over
53:39 video conference.
53:44 We also
53:46 decided to
53:48 cancel some of the site visits that would normally take place
53:51 for certain types of procurement
53:54 contracts.
53:55 So,
53:55 those were
53:57 specific clauses or terms that we introduced.
54:06 We also
54:07 established a specific time frame during which these
54:11 legal provisions would apply.
54:16 So we made some changes.
54:22 But we didn't want that to affect
54:24 how we processed all of the bids.
54:28 So even though we did change some of the parameters,
54:31 we wanted to make sure.
54:38 That we were
54:39 not excluding.
54:43 Suppliers from
54:45 the.
54:46 Bidding process.
54:51 So,
54:54 We
54:55 were able to extend some of our contracts.
55:00 Contracts that were already
55:02 uh signed.
55:06 And so some
55:07 buyers had the option of extending their contracts by one additional month.
55:16 But they couldn't go beyond a year-long extension.
55:23 So
55:26 That was the measure that we took and it only applied to
55:31 certain contracts that were signed.
55:38 So
55:40 If
55:41 a.
55:43 Buyer
55:44 had a contract that would expire
55:47 during COVID.
55:53 What we decided to do was to allow that buyer to extend the contract
55:59 for a certain period of time
56:02 until we were able to
56:04 uh launch
56:05 a new uh bidding process.
56:08 So,
56:08 again,
56:08 we weren't trying to eliminate any competition,
56:11 we were just trying to make sure that we were
56:17 Able to continue with certain contracts,
56:19 but these were limited cases.
56:21 They weren't.
56:24 Really going against the main principles that we have in place for
56:28 our.
56:29 Contracts.
56:31 Some of these measures were taken to
56:34 make things just a little bit easier for
56:38 The uh
56:39 bidders and our buyers.
56:46 In some
56:50 In some instances we were.
56:54 Able to remove certain
56:56 uh clauses that would specify
56:59 uh what uh suppliers could be used as well.
57:03 There were exclusivity clauses that we had in the past and some of these were
57:07 slightly modified.
57:13 We also saw that public procurement was a way to protect companies
57:20 that found themselves in very complicated situations during
57:24 uh this emergency period and protecting companies
57:28 also means
57:31 Protecting government money.
57:35 Because
57:37 No one wants to reduce,
57:39 uh,
57:39 competition
57:41 or see competition reduced because
57:43 companies are going bankrupt.
57:48 In some instances.
57:51 We
57:53 have uh sanctions attached to contracts.
57:56 If,
57:57 for instance,
57:57 the company does not uphold all of its obligations.
58:01 But during the state of emergency,
58:05 Uh,
58:05 some of those were.
58:09 Uh,
58:10 adjusted,
58:10 so we might have extended the execution period.
58:17 If,
58:17 for instance,
58:18 the.
58:19 The
58:20 contractor wasn't able to
58:23 execute the contract in the original time frame due to the pandemic.
58:34 We also.
58:40 Asked or allowed for buyers to show that.
58:45 They weren't able to execute the contract,
58:47 so they would have to provide some kind of proof or justification,
58:51 um.
58:54 Provide proof,
58:55 in other words,
58:56 that they were in a very difficult situation and
58:59 that would justify the extension of the execution period
59:03 or implementation period.
59:09 We also worked with a
59:12 range of companies and we.
59:15 Also,
59:17 Allowed
59:19 Buyers to.
59:22 Provide an advance at the beginning of the contract.
59:26 In order to
59:31 Not
59:32 give priority only to companies that have a lot of cash or a lot of cash flow.
59:42 So this
59:44 Uh,
59:45 helped out a lot of the companies that we worked with.
59:49 The museum that is not.
59:52 In the same way,
59:52 we also have set out a number of denunciation
59:56 measures
59:57 and in this case,
59:58 the buyer in uh had to um
1:00:02 Winning on the contract and we had to
1:00:05 uh compensate those companies.
1:00:08 That were actually uh excluded from the possibility of contracting
1:00:13 and uh bidding.
1:00:15 So I will stop there and uh just about the uh emergency arrangements that we adopted,
1:00:21 of course,
1:00:21 in the emergency uh situation,
1:00:23 which is,
1:00:24 is still one,
1:00:25 it is still,
1:00:26 uh,
1:00:26 this pandemic is still here and we are still
1:00:28 in a state of emergency.
1:00:33 I wanted to
1:00:34 emphasize.
1:00:37 The fact
1:00:38 that the French Ministry of Economy and Finance uh decided it would be crucial
1:00:44 to
1:00:46 really stick
1:00:47 to the guiding principles of public procurement in France
1:00:52 where
1:00:53 uh bidders are uh dealt with in a spirit of
1:00:56 transparency and openness and in a spirit of competitiveness.
1:01:01 We realized also
1:01:03 That's when we,
1:01:03 uh,
1:01:04 were out of the very first urgent emergency
1:01:08 situation that a number of these principles actually
1:01:10 were not as effective as all that or efficient as all that
1:01:13 and of course the fact that,
1:01:15 uh,
1:01:15 there was an exclusiveness was not so,
1:01:18 uh,
1:01:18 efficient and a number of companies
1:01:21 in uh
1:01:22 uh France who were asking not necessarily
1:01:24 for that but at least to have the possibility of
1:01:27 bidding and responding more effectively and efficiently to the market.
1:01:32 And uh reacting in this way,
1:01:34 and uh and,
1:01:36 and not really just sort of evolving in the margins.
1:01:38 Now,
1:01:38 I hope this presentation was clear,
1:01:40 and of course,
1:01:41 if you have any questions,
1:01:42 I'd be happy to answer them.
1:01:46 Very
1:01:47 insightful and it was particularly interesting the,
1:01:50 the special attention that you've provided to the
1:01:52 uh to the private companies.
1:01:54 It's sometimes we,
1:01:55 it is bypassed and it is very important that to
1:01:58 uh emphasize that.
1:01:59 Now we are moving to our next,
1:02:01 next country,
1:02:02 the panelist from Ecuador,
1:02:04 another country that unfortunately was hit hard by the pandemic.
1:02:07 Ms.
1:02:07 Paes,
1:02:08 the floor is yours.
1:02:35 Miss Bass,
1:02:36 you're muted.
1:02:46 Can you hear us.
1:02:49 OK,
1:02:49 now we have you.
1:02:50 Thank you.
1:02:53 Can you hear me now?
1:02:55 Yes.
1:02:57 Very well.
1:02:58 Thank you very much.
1:02:59 First of all,
1:02:59 I would like to thank you all for the invitation.
1:03:02 It has been very important
1:03:05 to hear the concept so far in terms of public
1:03:08 procurement and I think that this is an important moment
1:03:13 to think
1:03:14 and uh
1:03:16 implement all of the lessons learned from public contracting,
1:03:21 public procurement,
1:03:22 and the pandemic in the case of Ecuador,
1:03:24 we had a process in which
1:03:27 We declared the health emergency in Ecuador
1:03:32 and we needed to adapt all of the public procurement processes.
1:03:36 What do I mean by that?
1:03:38 We have a technology system
1:03:41 that is
1:03:42 mostly
1:03:43 digital
1:03:45 and uh the public does have access to that system,
1:03:48 but in terms of emergencies,
1:03:52 The process does not necessarily go through procurement,
1:03:57 rather,
1:03:58 it is an exceptional
1:04:01 process where the
1:04:03 Companies
1:04:05 where the entities.
1:04:08 Carry out direct contracting because they are supposed
1:04:12 to solve an immediate problem in addition to transparency
1:04:17 and
1:04:18 the competition.
1:04:20 Opportunity also becomes an important concept in
1:04:25 Under public procurement SE COP,
1:04:28 the public procurement entity carried out several actions.
1:04:32 First,
1:04:33 they created rules,
1:04:35 regulations,
1:04:36 resolutions.
1:04:39 104 and 105.
1:04:44 Asking the contracting parties
1:04:48 to publish on a specific portal.
1:04:52 Their actions and this was a portal for the emergency.
1:04:56 Why did we make this decision?
1:04:58 We made this decision.
1:05:01 Because SERCOP,
1:05:02 that is to say,
1:05:03 the Ecuador's procurement entity
1:05:07 does have
1:05:08 Control over the pre-contract stages and they can carry out oversight
1:05:14 and also implement processes whenever we have some
1:05:18 findings or we see something is wrong.
1:05:21 Clearly,
1:05:22 during an emergency,
1:05:24 everything goes by so fast,
1:05:26 everything happens so fast that it is not possible
1:05:29 to
1:05:30 stop
1:05:31 the processes whenever it is pre-contractual.
1:05:35 So,
1:05:36 first,
1:05:37 We asked them to publish
1:05:39 so we want this to be open data,
1:05:42 so we installed
1:05:44 an open data platform for the emergency so that
1:05:50 At real time,
1:05:51 all of the universities
1:05:53 do in real time all of the universities
1:05:55 and agencies do have access to the information.
1:05:58 So it became a binding rule
1:06:01 and it became
1:06:02 a milestone,
1:06:04 a landmark regulation in Ecuador.
1:06:07 It did have its consequences,
1:06:09 which were those consequences
1:06:11 by having open data,
1:06:13 by turning on the light.
1:06:15 As I
1:06:16 usually say,
1:06:17 we turn on the light in a room that used to be dark,
1:06:21 so we all started to see.
1:06:24 How suppliers
1:06:26 and contracting parties act
1:06:29 and this is important to understand because also
1:06:33 When we provide information,
1:06:35 we need to have maturity,
1:06:36 we need to be
1:06:38 understandable of that information to properly
1:06:42 digest the information and that was one of the decisions made.
1:06:46 On the other hand,
1:06:47 we do need to understand that the demand was
1:06:51 all over the place.
1:06:52 There was an increase of buyers and we had
1:06:56 a decrease in supply,
1:06:59 so for example,
1:07:02 The respirators or the,
1:07:05 or those who produce masks,
1:07:07 they used input from
1:07:10 supplies from China,
1:07:11 but China was out of that
1:07:13 and then prices were very volatile,
1:07:16 we needed to understand the market and I also agree with Peter who already did this,
1:07:21 we need to wonder whether
1:07:23 and understand
1:07:25 what would happen
1:07:26 with the market,
1:07:27 there was market failure.
1:07:29 And another element is that the local supply was insufficient
1:07:34 and not only locally but also internationally it became insufficient.
1:07:39 So it was
1:07:40 all over the place and it was
1:07:42 insufficient and we had a great deal of
1:07:46 uncertainty.
1:07:47 We had asymmetrical information what was going to happen,
1:07:50 how we were going to be
1:07:52 Planning what
1:07:54 the right price
1:07:55 to buy was volatile prices and in addition to that we had
1:08:00 a break
1:08:01 in the global supply chain,
1:08:04 all of these elements.
1:08:09 Lead us
1:08:10 to some,
1:08:11 to
1:08:12 try to analyze all of the details of the market.
1:08:15 So the next option
1:08:17 to have leverage power from
1:08:20 the point of view of the state was to generate centralized purchases,
1:08:25 consolidated purchases,
1:08:27 so that we could have higher bargaining power with the providers,
1:08:31 suppliers,
1:08:33 and also to be able to
1:08:35 create an impact on pricing.
1:08:38 On open data
1:08:39 on that platform that we had
1:08:42 generated,
1:08:43 we also saw how the providers had more information and they were able to
1:08:48 sell to an agency at a certain price but to a different price,
1:08:52 to a Different agency for the same good and on the same day and the same quantity.
1:08:57 Why?
1:08:58 They're playing,
1:08:58 they're playing with the market.
1:09:00 So
1:09:01 we created,
1:09:02 we
1:09:02 enacted regulations
1:09:05 and strategies for purchases and
1:09:08 I think it is very important that every time we had the information,
1:09:13 the actual data,
1:09:14 we were able to
1:09:17 Control concurrently,
1:09:20 so we were limited in our scope of action,
1:09:22 but whenever we had information,
1:09:24 whenever we had,
1:09:26 for example,
1:09:27 communication with the universities,
1:09:29 The public started to act.
1:09:31 They started to
1:09:33 present complaints and those complaints were straight to the office of the
1:09:39 Attorney general and we started to control concurrently.
1:09:43 So that was one of the impacts and also we had the feeling
1:09:47 that there is greater corruption and as you have already presented some examples,
1:09:53 how
1:09:54 the resources were misused.
1:09:58 We also saw that in Ecuador,
1:09:59 the prices of masks.
1:10:03 For example,
1:10:04 that were
1:10:05 in,
1:10:05 in some cases,
1:10:07 soccer fields were
1:10:09 rented because of the pandemic for some activities and also some
1:10:14 agencies that did not have specialization for
1:10:17 the production of masks were actually producing
1:10:20 them,
1:10:21 the market
1:10:21 changed and we have two options.
1:10:24 One,
1:10:24 we need to understand the market,
1:10:25 or two,
1:10:26 we also need to
1:10:28 see what
1:10:30 To the rest of the world.
1:10:31 So this is an industrial reconversion,
1:10:35 we do need to adapt the market,
1:10:37 we need to increase the flexibility and
1:10:41 These are actually questions,
1:10:42 should we do all that?
1:10:44 And
1:10:45 another important
1:10:47 takeaway in the case of Ecuador was that
1:10:52 Procurement during the emergencies
1:10:57 were important but when we opened up the data,
1:11:00 since they were out there for the public,
1:11:03 the individuals from the contracting
1:11:06 agencies
1:11:07 started to be afraid because they were going to be scrutinized by the public,
1:11:12 so we needed to develop manuals training online.
1:11:16 And uh during the emergency,
1:11:18 we also trained the contracting agencies for 24,000 public servants
1:11:26 so that they can act during the emergencies without making mistakes.
1:11:29 This was good.
1:11:31 It was good
1:11:32 for them to think twice
1:11:35 before buying something and also
1:11:37 for them to get trained.
1:11:43 In this regard,
1:11:44 we also generated information which is necessary for decision making.
1:11:49 We also created an open platform,
1:11:52 open data.
1:11:57 So
1:11:58 CoraPublicas.
1:11:59 EC and at this point we have had 200 million procurements during the emergency
1:12:05 that have led to 9
1:12:08 to the
1:12:10 To the participation of 911 agencies and we
1:12:14 do have the ranking throughout the areas,
1:12:16 the departments,
1:12:18 the agencies.
1:12:19 What was the result?
1:12:21 This
1:12:22 improved the information with the populations or COP got adapted
1:12:27 to the
1:12:29 To this open data
1:12:30 and we also have
1:12:34 this ISO for quality.
1:12:35 And also against bribery,
1:12:38 and in this case,
1:12:39 all of the institutional
1:12:41 processes are ready for an emergency,
1:12:44 we also made all of these processes transparent,
1:12:47 transparent,
1:12:48 we allowed for oversight,
1:12:50 we allowed for the communication of all of the information
1:12:54 with um the citizens and we also allowed to communicate
1:12:58 better information on the contracting entities and the
1:13:03 Parties that are acting in this process,
1:13:05 the dynamic part is what did we learn from all of this process,
1:13:09 we,
1:13:10 what are the lessons learned?
1:13:12 First,
1:13:13 we learned that the institutions need to be solid.
1:13:16 We do have a test,
1:13:19 the test is the pandemic
1:13:21 that
1:13:22 Tested the solidity and the response capacity of the institutions,
1:13:27 so the institutions need to be solid
1:13:30 and also have response capability.
1:13:33 Technology is the best transparency tool.
1:13:37 And also,
1:13:39 the rule of law is not enough.
1:13:41 We also need ways,
1:13:43 there,
1:13:44 there are always ways to avoid procurement,
1:13:46 so we need to have law
1:13:48 control,
1:13:49 oversight and strong technology platform as to procurement.
1:13:53 We need to talk about the comprehensive nature,
1:13:56 that is to say,
1:13:57 transparency,
1:13:57 ethics,
1:13:58 and during emergency.
1:14:00 The opportunity,
1:14:01 the timeliness of the actions and open data also
1:14:05 includes the population as part of social control,
1:14:08 social oversight to have concurrent
1:14:11 control to generate governance
1:14:13 and also decision making,
1:14:15 therefore.
1:14:17 When we look towards the future and the path to follow,
1:14:20 we need to make
1:14:23 Our own individuals within procurement more professional
1:14:27 and open data
1:14:29 should exist throughout the processes.
1:14:32 We should also include citizens,
1:14:35 train them,
1:14:36 teach them.
1:14:37 We also need to look into more modern technology
1:14:40 for procurement and also.
1:14:43 Think about the use of chatbox
1:14:45 in
1:14:46 artificial intelligence for
1:14:49 helping the users,
1:14:50 the intelligence within the business for suppliers and buyers and centralized
1:14:55 purchases are some of the basic elements and this is the way
1:14:58 that led Ecuador to create a project that we call centralized
1:15:04 purchasing project for strategic supplies and medicines to have a transparent
1:15:10 method.
1:15:11 Thank you very much.
1:15:15 Inspired for your insight and it is very interesting to see how you quickly reacted
1:15:19 to fix any issues that may come out from your transparency of the data.
1:15:23 Thank you so much.
1:15:24 We have
1:15:25 now to move on to our next country that will be Senegal,
1:15:28 Mr.
1:15:28 Nyang.
1:15:29 I'm pretty sure that he's waiting to share
1:15:31 with us,
1:15:32 uh,
1:15:32 the experience of Senegal.
1:15:34 Thank you,
1:15:34 Ms.
1:15:34 Nay.
1:15:40 Mercy,
1:15:41 Madame
1:15:42 Jasper.
1:15:44 Thank you kindly.
1:15:44 I hope you can hear me.
1:15:47 Yes,
1:15:48 to eat.
1:15:53 Hello.
1:15:57 Abumaandeka.
1:16:00 As you know,
1:16:01 The first COVID case,
1:16:03 COVID-19,
1:16:04 appeared in Senegal
1:16:05 at the beginning of March 2020.
1:16:09 And at the behest of all the uh countries affected,
1:16:13 a number of specific adapted arrangements adapted to the situation
1:16:17 were
1:16:19 in uh
1:16:19 applied in uh um
1:16:21 in
1:16:22 an emergency situation.
1:16:24 So when you don't have a public procurement system
1:16:27 at the outset,
1:16:28 you have to create
1:16:29 one
1:16:30 and that may be insufficient,
1:16:32 so you need to have additional
1:16:33 measures adopted
1:16:35 in order to
1:16:36 uh
1:16:36 complete
1:16:37 your response.
1:16:39 So our response was organized on two levels.
1:16:41 First of all,
1:16:42 a review of the codes of public procurement,
1:16:46 as well as the existing arrangements,
1:16:49 and then adapt these to the emergency situation as was the case when
1:16:53 the pandemic struck.
1:16:55 As well as the adoption of new uh measures better adapted to the
1:17:01 situation and in order to better respond to COVID-19 in order to avoid,
1:17:06 avoid a humanitarian crisis
1:17:09 and with a number of uh humanitarian
1:17:12 Uh,
1:17:12 modalities as announced by the World Health Organization.
1:17:16 By way of information,
1:17:16 I'd like to recall that Senegal
1:17:19 led a,
1:17:20 uh,
1:17:20 full reform of its procurement,
1:17:22 public procurement market system
1:17:24 in 2008
1:17:25 by
1:17:26 applying
1:17:27 the,
1:17:27 um,
1:17:29 WIMU
1:17:30 directives.
1:17:31 Eight countries are members of WIMMU
1:17:33 and all the number of countries.
1:17:35 We've started to internalize the uh directives in terms of public
1:17:41 procurement with different,
1:17:42 with different sectors.
1:17:44 So this led to a way more directive,
1:17:47 and that triggered the modification of a fundamental
1:17:51 law.
1:17:53 Which is the code of administration obligations,
1:17:56 which devoted a number of important principles in terms of public
1:18:01 procurement and orders.
1:18:02 What was added or modified rather in this whole apparatus
1:18:06 were rules that govern preparation,
1:18:09 uh,
1:18:10 markets contract award,
1:18:11 as well as the whole public procurement,
1:18:14 uh,
1:18:15 process.
1:18:15 All of this
1:18:16 is
1:18:18 stipulated in our decrees.
1:18:21 And so there are specific categories of buyers and suppliers,
1:18:27 but they can never uh be
1:18:29 under or out of the cover of the specific uh rules of application.
1:18:33 Another specific clause was added.
1:18:36 And the same law actually prescribes that an open
1:18:40 tendering bidding process is the actual mode of contract award
1:18:45 and the contracting authorities
1:18:47 by way of principle
1:18:48 must have recourses,
1:18:50 recourse to this,
1:18:51 and there can be no waivers to those
1:18:54 specific conditions as stipulated in our guidelines.
1:18:57 Now simultaneously,
1:18:58 simultaneously in the public procurement
1:19:01 processes,
1:19:02 a number.
1:19:04 Of countries and.
1:19:07 As
1:19:08 All our member countries,
1:19:10 this relies
1:19:11 on the same directives with the transparency and
1:19:14 openness of the procedure and a number of principles
1:19:17 that
1:19:18 actually had been difficult to reconcile
1:19:22 with the requirements and means of selectivity and emergency.
1:19:27 And in Senegal,
1:19:28 there is an arrangement which is
1:19:30 favorable to emergency
1:19:32 acquisitions,
1:19:33 especially
1:19:34 when these are imperious,
1:19:35 and there is a,
1:19:37 a code which is the outcome of the 2018 reform that stipulates
1:19:42 that
1:19:43 in those situations where there is an extreme and urgent need,
1:19:48 especially an unforeseeable consequence or something
1:19:50 that happened and that falls beyond
1:19:53 uh the contract.
1:19:55 There has to be,
1:19:57 there
1:19:58 is an open procedure that has to be triggered and it has to be transparent.
1:20:03 That same article.
1:20:05 Extends the scope of application and this uh waiver to
1:20:10 the markets with general mobilization measures as well as alert
1:20:14 measures,
1:20:15 red flag measures.
1:20:16 At the same time,
1:20:17 we have to recall
1:20:19 that the direct processes stipulated by
1:20:22 this article
1:20:24 was submitted to
1:20:25 uh control with a prior
1:20:27 authorization of a priori contracting.
1:20:31 Which stipulates according to the state which disposes of 24 hours to respond.
1:20:37 Should there be an unfavorable reaction or notice
1:20:40 because the state does not have to give a uh an authorization,
1:20:44 but should there be an unfavorable notice,
1:20:46 the contracting authority
1:20:48 has to
1:20:49 notify the supervising body.
1:20:52 And then the Secretary-General of the presidency has to be
1:20:56 notified
1:20:57 and then a statement is made as to the
1:21:00 unfavorable uh
1:21:02 decision made by the
1:21:03 uh Central Directorate of Public
1:21:05 procurement,
1:21:06 which is the a priori
1:21:08 controlling
1:21:09 and oversight entities.
1:21:10 I,
1:21:10 I can understand that some of these procedures.
1:21:13 Actually,
1:21:14 uh,
1:21:15 pushed
1:21:15 the,
1:21:16 uh,
1:21:16 public authorities during the pandemic
1:21:20 to adopt a new decree
1:21:22 and something that would be better adapted to responding to the pandemic and
1:21:27 also preparing for
1:21:28 future ones.
1:21:29 And so the
1:21:31 point here
1:21:31 was to uh create an article which was adopted on March 18,
1:21:36 2020
1:21:37 and which
1:21:38 excludes out of the scope of.
1:21:40 Application of public procurement,
1:21:42 the,
1:21:42 the application of work,
1:21:44 supply or services of
1:21:46 supply of goods and services in fighting against the
1:21:50 pandemic.
1:21:50 So those two articles are important and were adopted.
1:21:53 What is also important to mention is that the decree was not very precise
1:21:57 as to the codes that would be eligible
1:22:00 and so this leads the way to all sorts of interpretations.
1:22:04 But of course,
1:22:05 in these kinds of situations,
1:22:06 what is feared is that
1:22:08 some contracting authority behavior
1:22:11 will
1:22:12 actually engage
1:22:13 uh
1:22:14 uneligible and inadmissible um
1:22:17 players,
1:22:18 but of course,
1:22:19 this does not put away the
1:22:22 emergency
1:22:23 uh procedures that have to be adopted in states
1:22:26 of emergency and the obligations that I've just recalled,
1:22:30 as well as the transparency arrangements.
1:22:34 You will also agree with me
1:22:36 that the choice of a confidential
1:22:39 procedure
1:22:40 and communication
1:22:42 are constraints,
1:22:42 but these are sound practices,
1:22:44 of course,
1:22:45 because it makes it possible
1:22:46 to combine
1:22:48 the
1:22:48 uh
1:22:50 Speed of action as well as safeguarding the principles
1:22:54 and access to information in an open fashion.
1:22:58 And of course,
1:22:58 this allows for savings and guaranteeing of the quality of products.
1:23:05 And so a part of the social budget that had to be allocated
1:23:09 to
1:23:10 the health sector in COVID-19.
1:23:14 This also had to involve the uh
1:23:17 acquisition of
1:23:19 food
1:23:20 supplies from Burkina Faso.
1:23:22 And we also suggested
1:23:24 that a new procedure,
1:23:26 a confidential procedure,
1:23:28 be launched within the framework of a direct competitive
1:23:31 dialogue with several suppliers that had been selected
1:23:34 after
1:23:35 uh communication and publicity campaigns had
1:23:38 been launched defining the specifications.
1:23:42 Lotte contractant of the CD alale.
1:23:45 Alou
1:23:49 In addition to this example.
1:23:55 We applied waivers
1:23:58 so that some suppliers would be able to provide their.
1:24:04 Goods more
1:24:06 quickly.
1:24:10 In some instances.
1:24:13 The dispute committee had to get involved.
1:24:18 And resolve some of these issues.
1:24:25 Responses were provided,
1:24:27 uh,
1:24:27 which reflects the importance
1:24:30 of the contracting authority and these commissions.
1:24:36 These commissions exist to make sure that the scope of application is followed.
1:24:43 The contracting authorities.
1:24:47 Who wanted
1:24:48 to.
1:24:50 Undertake
1:24:51 undertake direct contracting,
1:24:54 often encountered issues and had to provide.
1:25:00 A justification
1:25:01 for why they wanted to use that specific type of contracting.
1:25:09 In some instances,
1:25:11 audits will need to be conducted to make sure that the contracts
1:25:16 are in compliance
1:25:19 uh with the decrees that have been passed.
1:25:21 It is also important to note here
1:25:24 that
1:25:28 The
1:25:30 The situation has really improved in Senegal a lot,
1:25:34 and so some of these
1:25:36 decrees have.
1:25:39 Uh,
1:25:39 been put to an end,
1:25:41 uh,
1:25:41 as the authorities determined that there really wasn't a use for them anymore,
1:25:46 specifically because,
1:25:48 uh,
1:25:48 the pandemic situation has improved in
1:25:51 Senegal.
1:25:53 We also took measures in Senegal to stop the spread of the pandemic,
1:25:57 and these were authorized by authorities at the beginning of the pandemic.
1:26:02 There were restrictions on
1:26:05 movement between regions and public and private gatherings.
1:26:10 These measures were often
1:26:12 difficult to reconcile with some of our public procurement rules.
1:26:24 to,
1:26:24 to,
1:26:24 to share of the countries has a very rich experience now dealing with the pandemic,
1:26:27 and I'm sure we can stay here for hours,
1:26:29 but we have also to leave the floor to two other countries.
1:26:33 Then,
1:26:33 uh,
1:26:34 I would please ask your
1:26:35 permission to continue with our next speaker.
1:26:42 We are now inviting Morocco
1:26:44 to share uh and Mr.
1:26:46 Labdawi to share his
1:26:48 thoughts
1:26:49 on
1:26:51 On the topic and please Mr.
1:26:53 uh Labdawi,
1:26:54 if you can
1:26:55 uh keep your discussion in 10 minutes,
1:26:57 I would really appreciate it.
1:26:58 Thank you.
1:27:13 Thank you very much.
1:27:15 I hope you're able to hear me.
1:27:21 Allow me to introduce myself.
1:27:24 My name is Abdelak Labdawi.
1:27:27 I work.
1:27:31 In Morocco on public procurement,
1:27:34 and it is a pleasure for me to discuss this very important topic with you today.
1:27:39 I'm going to share Morocco's experience with you today.
1:27:44 My
1:27:45 presentation.
1:27:47 We'll discuss the following.
1:27:49 The challenges of public procurement in Morocco.
1:27:53 And
1:27:54 I
1:27:55 will also mention here that
1:28:00 Based on data from 2019,
1:28:02 uh,
1:28:03 public procurement.
1:28:09 Accounts for a,
1:28:12 for 20% of GDP.
1:28:16 And many of this goes to construction.
1:28:21 The interpreter notes that there's a great deal of interference in the audio.
1:28:25 Apologies.
1:28:27 I think another microphone
1:28:29 is on.
1:28:34 No,
1:28:34 everyone else is talking,
1:28:35 can you please mute yourself?
1:28:37 Thank you.
1:28:43 Sebon mercy
1:28:51 Public procurement.
1:28:53 Accounts for a great deal of our economic activity,
1:28:57 and it has a multiplier effect.
1:29:00 On every sector of the economy.
1:29:02 Let's talk a little bit about the context in which these measures were taken
1:29:07 for public procurement.
1:29:11 A state of emergency was declared.
1:29:16 By
1:29:17 a decree.
1:29:20 On March 23rd of this year.
1:29:22 And this
1:29:23 decree
1:29:25 is the legal basis
1:29:28 for
1:29:28 declaring
1:29:29 the
1:29:30 state of emergency
1:29:32 and allows us to look at current regulation and adapt it to the circumstances
1:29:37 of the time.
1:29:39 With regard to the main provisions that Morocco took
1:29:43 to address public procurement during the pandemic.
1:29:49 A decision was made to focus
1:29:52 initially.
1:29:53 On
1:29:55 The actual procurement process.
1:29:58 And secondly,
1:29:59 we focused on the execution of contracts.
1:30:03 And
1:30:04 finally,
1:30:05 we adopted
1:30:06 specific measures
1:30:07 uh for the public health sector.
1:30:11 With regard to measures taken
1:30:13 that affected the procurement process itself,
1:30:16 the main measures are as follows.
1:30:19 We extended
1:30:21 the
1:30:23 Uh,
1:30:24 validity period for
1:30:28 certification for,
1:30:30 uh,
1:30:30 various entities that we worked with,
1:30:31 laboratories,
1:30:33 companies,
1:30:34 etc.
1:30:35 Some companies had certification for procurement
1:30:38 that actually expired during the lockdown period
1:30:40 and we had to make sure that their certification could be extended.
1:30:45 At that time,
1:30:46 we weren't able to meet in person to address that issue and so,
1:30:51 We decided.
1:30:54 To just
1:30:55 extend the validity period of the certificates that
1:30:58 we had already awarded to those companies and
1:31:02 laboratories.
1:31:05 As
1:31:08 You know,
1:31:08 we would,
1:31:09 in the past publish our procurement
1:31:11 announcements in physical newspapers or journals.
1:31:16 So we decided to
1:31:18 make a change there and publish those announcements
1:31:21 electronically.
1:31:26 Morocco.
1:31:28 Starting in 2017
1:31:31 has advanced slowly but surely.
1:31:36 Towards
1:31:38 electronic systems.
1:31:39 We hope to have all of this in place by 2021.
1:31:43 But you also need to make sure that electronic signatures are possible.
1:31:54 So that you can
1:31:58 Authentify or authenticate rather,
1:32:00 uh,
1:32:00 the signatures,
1:32:01 the electronic signatures.
1:32:03 So that also needed to be
1:32:06 addressed.
1:32:09 So we decided
1:32:10 to digitize all of the documents
1:32:14 that
1:32:16 are involved in the procurement process.
1:32:18 So everything could be done electronically and that would allow procurement
1:32:22 to take place
1:32:23 without requiring people to physically
1:32:26 travel.
1:32:31 We
1:32:31 also decided.
1:32:35 To
1:32:39 Make changes to our portal,
1:32:42 our procurement portal and make it a little bit easier while at the same
1:32:47 time ensuring the security and integrity of
1:32:51 everything that was uploaded to that platform.
1:32:54 Now let me move on to the 2nd set of measures that we're taking,
1:32:57 taken.
1:32:59 In some instances,
1:33:00 we were able to extend the length of the contract,
1:33:03 as my colleague from France mentioned as well.
1:33:08 This,
1:33:09 uh,
1:33:10 prevented,
1:33:11 uh,
1:33:12 certain penalties from being applied.
1:33:14 But of course,
1:33:15 uh,
1:33:15 proof or justification would have to be,
1:33:18 uh,
1:33:18 presented in order to
1:33:20 extend those.
1:33:23 Contracts.
1:33:27 In other instances.
1:33:31 We
1:33:32 put a moratorium on certain payments that would have to be made
1:33:36 uh due to uh the
1:33:39 uh health emergency that was
1:33:41 declared.
1:33:45 We wanted to make sure that we weren't
1:33:48 hindering companies in any way.
1:33:51 Uh,
1:33:52 especially if they were experiencing cash flow issues.
1:33:59 We also required certain signatures for various parts of the contracting process.
1:34:07 And so we decided.
1:34:09 And not to uh ask for paper documents during the
1:34:14 uh pandemic.
1:34:15 A lot of this could be done electronically or
1:34:18 electronic documents or electronic signature.
1:34:25 We looked at other regulations as well.
1:34:33 We looked at certain provisions.
1:34:38 Uh,
1:34:38 specifically.
1:34:40 Uh,
1:34:40 an article on payment.
1:34:46 We had certain ceilings in place before the
1:34:49 pandemic and uh we adjusted those ceilings.
1:34:54 Uh,
1:34:55 during the pandemic.
1:35:01 We also granted.
1:35:03 Other waivers that apply to other parts of the public procurement decree.
1:35:12 In some instances,
1:35:14 uh,
1:35:14 certain contracts were awarded and it wasn't
1:35:17 always necessary to go through a competitive,
1:35:19 uh,
1:35:20 process.
1:35:21 Here,
1:35:22 I'd like to
1:35:23 Note that this kind of flexibility doesn't automatically mean
1:35:28 that
1:35:29 we completely
1:35:30 ignored
1:35:32 our
1:35:32 main principles of public procurement,
1:35:35 which is,
1:35:36 uh,
1:35:36 having open access to the procurement process.
1:35:40 We kept files of everything.
1:35:42 Everything is traced and you can always go back and,
1:35:46 uh,
1:35:47 look at all of the expenditures that were
1:35:49 made to see if there were any discrepancies.
1:35:56 We
1:35:58 Also.
1:36:02 Uh,
1:36:02 made some adjustments
1:36:04 to the rules governing the,
1:36:07 uh,
1:36:07 expenditures,
1:36:09 uh,
1:36:09 due to
1:36:10 the circumstances of the pandemic.
1:36:14 We decided to um
1:36:17 stop these measures last August.
1:36:22 Because there was no longer uh any justification for it due to
1:36:26 uh the change in circumstances.
1:36:30 Here,
1:36:30 I'd also like to note that in 2019,
1:36:34 we received 16,000 bids electronically over the entire course of the year.
1:36:39 But for the 1st 10 months
1:36:41 of 2020,
1:36:43 we received 31,000
1:36:46 electronic bids,
1:36:47 which is twice as many as we received the previous year.
1:36:51 And this was mainly due to the extraordinary progress
1:36:55 that we have made in uh going paperless for our procurement processes.
1:37:01 Allow me to conclude here with just a few words.
1:37:05 I think that we were successful
1:37:08 in Morocco in countering the negative effects of the pandemic.
1:37:13 Uh,
1:37:13 thanks to the 5 following points.
1:37:16 One,
1:37:16 we adopted a preventive
1:37:19 cooperative approach.
1:37:21 2,
1:37:22 we have a strategic oversight entities.
1:37:26 3,
1:37:26 we provided support measures
1:37:29 and we'd already made a great deal of headway in going paperless.
1:37:34 And we also,
1:37:35 uh,
1:37:35 made a lot of uh attempts to grant waivers when necessary.
1:37:39 Thank you very much.
1:37:43 Ms.
1:37:43 Lavdawi,
1:37:43 it was very interesting to see that Morocco
1:37:46 is progressing so much in public procurement.
1:37:48 Now we are going to our,
1:37:50 uh,
1:37:50 list,
1:37:51 last but not least,
1:37:52 uh,
1:37:52 country
1:37:53 representatives that is,
1:37:55 uh,
1:37:55 Ms.
1:37:55 Hang
1:37:56 from Vietnam.
1:37:58 I would kindly ask Ms.
1:37:59 Hank to take the floor
1:38:01 and please turn your camera on.
1:38:06 Ms.
1:38:06 Hang.
1:38:11 Ms.
1:38:11 Han,
1:38:12 can you hear us?
1:38:21 Miss Hang.
1:38:33 Do we have any
1:38:36 Difficulties
1:38:37 to connect with Hang.
1:38:41 OK,
1:38:42 in,
1:38:42 uh,
1:38:43 while we wait for Ms.
1:38:44 Hang to connect,
1:38:45 we can move on to
1:38:47 and go in-house.
1:38:49 And have our
1:38:52 Speakers from discussions from the World Bank.
1:38:59 Belita.
1:39:01 Can you tube in and let us know your thoughts?
1:39:05 From this discussion so far and also,
1:39:07 OK,
1:39:08 and also how the World Bank sees the COVID-19 response.
1:39:14 Yes,
1:39:14 thank you very much for having me.
1:39:16 It was a
1:39:17 great pleasure for me to be part of this distinguished and honorable panel.
1:39:21 I enjoyed the discussions very much.
1:39:24 Um,
1:39:24 the presentations,
1:39:25 the remarks by Peter and Carrie,
1:39:27 very relevant and,
1:39:28 uh,
1:39:29 Um,
1:39:30 very,
1:39:30 um,
1:39:31 informative and also thought provoking and
1:39:34 the experience from colleagues in other countries.
1:39:37 Um,
1:39:37 in listening to all this discussion,
1:39:40 um,
1:39:40 uh,
1:39:41 it,
1:39:41 it seems that,
1:39:42 uh,
1:39:43 what I hear resonates with what,
1:39:45 with what we have seen
1:39:46 in,
1:39:47 um,
1:39:47 uh,
1:39:48 bank,
1:39:48 uh,
1:39:49 engagement with countries during this period.
1:39:52 And it is clear that
1:39:53 countries all mobilized to uh adopt or adapt their legislation
1:39:59 to the increasingly challenging and urgent situation of COVID-19.
1:40:03 Um,
1:40:04 different ways either triggering or enhancing the existing
1:40:08 systems by direct contracting or non-competitive procurement.
1:40:12 Uh,
1:40:12 along with guidance and technical guidance or FAQs or uh tips and sheets to,
1:40:18 uh,
1:40:18 inform the procuring entities and help them come up to speed.
1:40:22 In some countries,
1:40:23 the fresh legislation to respond to the needs,
1:40:25 in others,
1:40:27 certain carve-outs from the procurement legislation itself.
1:40:29 As for the bank,
1:40:31 Um,
1:40:32 in bank-funded projects,
1:40:33 we also did the same in enhancing and simplifying our existing
1:40:38 provisions.
1:40:39 Uh,
1:40:39 it became clear that while the focus of the government was to respond
1:40:44 to the emerging needs to fight and contain COVID-19 to save lives,
1:40:48 um,
1:40:49 it is also clear that governments are struggling
1:40:52 or at least are trying to balance the needs
1:40:55 while procuring these large volumes of goods.
1:40:57 We heard from KAERI about what
1:40:59 $100 billion in 4 months
1:41:01 with increased commercial and integrity risks associated with
1:41:05 this procurement.
1:41:07 We heard and uh we've seen exactly the same that
1:41:11 while the focus is on
1:41:13 COVID-19 response procurement,
1:41:15 PPEs,
1:41:16 ventilators,
1:41:17 all these
1:41:18 uh supplies that are needed to save lives,
1:41:21 on the other hand,
1:41:22 there is a whole
1:41:23 universe of procurement that is already happening in the country.
1:41:26 That is not directly related
1:41:28 to COVID-19,
1:41:30 but that is equally important.
1:41:32 Infrastructure projects that were interrupted,
1:41:35 schools,
1:41:35 um,
1:41:36 textbooks,
1:41:37 uh,
1:41:37 other,
1:41:38 uh,
1:41:38 health projects or health,
1:41:40 health activities that were going on
1:41:42 in different,
1:41:43 um,
1:41:44 sectors that were also disrupted and I see that,
1:41:47 uh,
1:41:47 while the focus of this discussion is on COVID-19 response procurement,
1:41:51 that is very important to,
1:41:53 to keep in mind.
1:41:54 Um,
1:41:55 and what I hear as well and what we saw in the bank,
1:41:58 um,
1:41:59 response,
1:41:59 uh,
1:42:00 uh,
1:42:00 to COVID-19 in,
1:42:01 in client countries
1:42:03 that
1:42:04 what is important is to integrate procurement
1:42:06 in the larger operational risk framework.
1:42:08 Procurement rules are not the magic bullet.
1:42:10 Peter said it and he couldn't have said it better.
1:42:13 This is not a legal issue but a market issue,
1:42:16 a capacity issue,
1:42:17 uh,
1:42:17 in many cases,
1:42:18 integrity issue.
1:42:20 Um,
1:42:20 so procurement is not The only puzzle,
1:42:23 or a piece of the puzzle.
1:42:24 It is
1:42:25 a part of a conundrum where clients have to
1:42:28 balance all these competing interests of responding to the emergency,
1:42:32 ensuring transparency,
1:42:33 but at the same time,
1:42:35 um,
1:42:35 delivering the goods that they need.
1:42:37 Uh,
1:42:37 digitalization of procurement procedures seems to have been the
1:42:40 common theme that is our experience too that helped
1:42:43 the countries to immediately respond
1:42:46 but also to increase the transparency.
1:42:48 And what this crisis meant is an opportunity for reform.
1:42:52 First,
1:42:53 professionalization of procurement workforce is even more
1:42:56 important than just writing
1:42:59 great rules,
1:43:00 um,
1:43:00 you know,
1:43:00 that
1:43:01 are,
1:43:01 of course,
1:43:02 the,
1:43:02 the,
1:43:03 the,
1:43:03 the starting point but are not sufficient.
1:43:05 Empowering and encouraging public officials to take decisions without fear
1:43:10 of being,
1:43:11 um,
1:43:11 retributed,
1:43:12 of retribution of Fear of being audited and,
1:43:15 and being prosecuted.
1:43:16 In many countries we have seen
1:43:18 in response to procurement by COVID-19,
1:43:21 um,
1:43:21 lots of procurement officials are finding themselves into
1:43:24 having to defend these decisions which on one hand,
1:43:27 of,
1:43:27 of course we can't do without accountability.
1:43:30 On the other hand,
1:43:31 we have to
1:43:32 uh allow this,
1:43:33 this balance that people take decisions in the interest of,
1:43:37 of public interest.
1:43:38 And finally,
1:43:40 I would think since we have these lessons in the last 8 months,
1:43:43 are we prepared now for the second phase of
1:43:46 um of procurement of vaccines?
1:43:49 Um,
1:43:50 do we feel that,
1:43:51 do,
1:43:52 uh,
1:43:52 we feel that we have in place,
1:43:54 uh,
1:43:54 and now we have the knowledge to implement all those lessons that
1:43:58 we learned from the first phase in the procurement of vaccines which
1:44:01 will be equally challenging
1:44:03 and,
1:44:03 um,
1:44:04 I,
1:44:04 I leave it there.
1:44:06 Thank you,
1:44:07 thank you so much,
1:44:08 uh,
1:44:08 Belita.
1:44:09 I,
1:44:09 I'm sure that if we can continue you can always
1:44:13 guide us and
1:44:15 let us know more on,
1:44:16 on the procurement on,
1:44:17 on under the bank view.
1:44:18 But,
1:44:19 but now we have Ms.
1:44:20 Hang back.
1:44:21 Ms.
1:44:22 Hang,
1:44:23 I'm sorry that we lost you for,
1:44:24 for a second.
1:44:26 Can I ask you to
1:44:28 start with your presentation?
1:44:30 Thank you.
1:44:31 Yes.
1:44:32 Can't you hear me well?
1:44:35 Hello,
1:44:36 everyone.
1:44:38 Let me introduce myself.
1:44:40 Uh,
1:44:41 my name is Han.
1:44:42 I'm working for
1:44:44 the Ministry of Planning
1:44:46 and Investment
1:44:47 and,
1:44:48 uh,
1:44:48 under the
1:44:50 Public procurement agency.
1:44:53 Today,
1:44:54 I'd like to share
1:44:56 Vietnam's
1:44:58 experience.
1:44:59 In
1:45:00 procurement.
1:45:02 Uh,
1:45:02 medical
1:45:03 supplies and equipment
1:45:06 in,
1:45:06 uh,
1:45:07 COVID
1:45:08 pandemic.
1:45:10 Uh,
1:45:10 first,
1:45:11 uh,
1:45:12 in related to,
1:45:14 uh,
1:45:14 legislation
1:45:15 in Vietnam,
1:45:16 we have,
1:45:17 uh,
1:45:17 public procurement law.
1:45:20 And in the law,
1:45:22 we
1:45:23 permit
1:45:24 recruiting entity
1:45:26 to use
1:45:28 direct contracting
1:45:29 for procurement in
1:45:32 benefits.
1:45:34 And uh the system in Vietnam
1:45:37 is decentralized
1:45:40 so that
1:45:41 each procuring entity is in charge of what they buy.
1:45:45 And
1:45:47 How,
1:45:48 how much do you buy
1:45:49 and the price.
1:45:52 And in our law,
1:45:53 we also allow for a repeat order.
1:45:57 So that
1:45:59 if they,
1:46:00 uh,
1:46:00 if any supplier win.
1:46:03 It's a bit
1:46:05 before
1:46:06 and now in when the big situation
1:46:09 you NTT.
1:46:11 Can apply.
1:46:13 The same price
1:46:15 and the same condition of contract
1:46:19 to that uh
1:46:22 particular goods,
1:46:24 let's say,
1:46:25 uh,
1:46:26 any uh
1:46:27 uh ventilator or any uh
1:46:30 medical equipment.
1:46:32 So that we can control the price
1:46:35 and
1:46:36 at the time as well.
1:46:38 And uh
1:46:40 that is in,
1:46:41 in,
1:46:41 in our law.
1:46:43 Uh,
1:46:43 I mean that uh in legislation,
1:46:46 we allow
1:46:47 uh flexibility
1:46:50 for
1:46:51 blue entity
1:46:53 to buy the thing in time.
1:46:55 And to enable action
1:46:58 in dealing with benefit.
1:47:00 But in practice,
1:47:02 we face
1:47:04 some difficulty.
1:47:06 The first one is um
1:47:08 the supply capacity.
1:47:11 Uh,
1:47:12 back to March
1:47:15 and February.
1:47:17 So you may,
1:47:19 uh,
1:47:19 let's say for example,
1:47:20 for
1:47:23 Medical mass
1:47:25 is very high
1:47:27 and it's increasing day by day.
1:47:30 As you know that the population of Vietnam
1:47:33 now is over 90 million people.
1:47:38 So,
1:47:39 in domestic,
1:47:40 uh,
1:47:41 we are like
1:47:42 a mask.
1:47:44 And
1:47:47 Therefore,
1:47:47 it
1:47:48 uh Uruguay entity,
1:47:49 I means it a hospital.
1:47:52 Have to compete each other.
1:47:56 To buy masks.
1:47:58 And when uh
1:47:59 we have a look at the data,
1:48:02 it's at a price,
1:48:03 uh,
1:48:04 is
1:48:05 the price different,
1:48:06 differ.
1:48:08 Between
1:48:08 hospital and hospital.
1:48:11 But luckily that um
1:48:14 compared to the market price.
1:48:17 Uh,
1:48:17 supply its a hospital bed.
1:48:21 is even uh
1:48:23 much lower.
1:48:25 It's about 1/3 or
1:48:27 uh
1:48:28 um
1:48:29 half
1:48:30 or half of the market price.
1:48:33 But
1:48:35 I fluctuated.
1:48:37 And each hospital have different price for the mask.
1:48:44 So that we decide to increase
1:48:46 the domestic um
1:48:49 supply.
1:48:51 And
1:48:52 the Ministry of Health and Ministry of Commerce
1:48:56 work slowly
1:48:57 with industry.
1:48:59 To
1:49:00 uh manufacture,
1:49:02 manufacture the masks.
1:49:05 And at the first stage,
1:49:07 we don't have much uh surgical mask.
1:49:11 So
1:49:12 for the population,
1:49:14 for the people
1:49:16 outside hospital,
1:49:17 we encourage them to use
1:49:20 cotton.
1:49:21 Uh,
1:49:21 masks
1:49:22 that the Vietnam can
1:49:25 do,
1:49:25 uh,
1:49:26 as much
1:49:27 as,
1:49:27 as we want because
1:49:29 we export a lot of garment
1:49:32 products.
1:49:33 So for cotton masks,
1:49:34 uh,
1:49:35 it is easier
1:49:36 for us.
1:49:37 So we encourage people
1:49:39 to use
1:49:41 cotton
1:49:41 masks.
1:49:43 And
1:49:44 uh to live,
1:49:45 uh,
1:49:45 to save
1:49:46 the surgical mask for
1:49:49 hospital.
1:49:50 And then in uh Apple
1:49:53 and May,
1:49:55 and we agreed to supply
1:49:57 so that even for
1:49:59 surgical
1:50:00 uh marks or cotton mug,
1:50:02 uh,
1:50:03 we,
1:50:04 we have
1:50:05 uh a very high production
1:50:09 of these goods and
1:50:11 we even can export
1:50:13 to overseas
1:50:15 for masks.
1:50:17 That is the,
1:50:18 the,
1:50:19 the for,
1:50:19 uh,
1:50:19 we,
1:50:20 we face,
1:50:22 uh,
1:50:23 in supply
1:50:25 and we try to overcome it.
1:50:27 And now we become
1:50:29 a spotter
1:50:31 for it.
1:50:32 And the second one is a
1:50:34 ventilator.
1:50:37 Uh,
1:50:37 in Vietnam,
1:50:38 we
1:50:40 We are,
1:50:41 uh,
1:50:42 we have a very limited number
1:50:44 of ventilators.
1:50:46 We have more than
1:50:47 90 million people.
1:50:50 But
1:50:51 uh
1:50:52 throughoutucachi,
1:50:55 we only have more than 4000 ventilators.
1:51:03 And luckily for Vietnam that we control the ban,
1:51:06 ban the week very well
1:51:07 and until now,
1:51:08 we only have uh
1:51:11 1300
1:51:14 Yeah.
1:51:16 Infected people.
1:51:18 So I don't know if uh the number of infected people increase fast.
1:51:22 I don't know what,
1:51:23 what will happen
1:51:25 for Vietnam.
1:51:26 Maybe we,
1:51:26 we will become
1:51:28 in panic.
1:51:31 Uh,
1:51:31 at that time,
1:51:33 because we only have 4000,
1:51:35 uh,
1:51:35 ventilator,
1:51:36 and it is not easy to buy
1:51:39 even with contract,
1:51:40 um,
1:51:42 direct contracting
1:51:43 because there's no supply.
1:51:45 Uh,
1:51:46 in
1:51:47 other country,
1:51:48 they forbid export.
1:51:52 So what we
1:51:53 try is that
1:51:55 we um
1:51:57 Uh,
1:51:58 we buy,
1:51:59 uh,
1:52:01 a ventilator is stuck
1:52:02 in Vietnam.
1:52:04 And after that,
1:52:06 we try to persuade our industry.
1:52:10 To manufacture ventilator.
1:52:13 And one big guy in Vietnam,
1:52:16 do that follows.
1:52:18 And,
1:52:19 and they now even
1:52:21 export
1:52:22 so that uh
1:52:24 in case of uh ventilator,
1:52:26 we,
1:52:27 we can,
1:52:27 Vietnam can produce
1:52:30 and uh
1:52:31 we don't have much pro profit
1:52:34 with that.
1:52:36 At
1:52:36 present,
1:52:37 and now.
1:52:39 And
1:52:40 um
1:52:41 Uh,
1:52:42 that is the,
1:52:43 the,
1:52:43 the first difficulty,
1:52:46 which is the supply capacity.
1:52:48 And
1:52:50 we try to,
1:52:50 to,
1:52:51 to produce domestically.
1:52:55 And the second one is uh
1:52:57 the price
1:52:58 of the other
1:53:00 medical equipment.
1:53:02 And with modern
1:53:03 uh
1:53:04 medical equipment,
1:53:05 we cannot produce ourselves.
1:53:08 We have to embark.
1:53:11 But the price is very,
1:53:13 very,
1:53:14 uh,
1:53:15 differ
1:53:16 and it,
1:53:17 it,
1:53:17 it,
1:53:17 it,
1:53:17 it differ from hospital to hospital,
1:53:20 from that province to the other province,
1:53:23 and that is a difficult question for us that,
1:53:27 uh,
1:53:28 how to manage the price.
1:53:31 We give the flexibility
1:53:33 to hospital.
1:53:36 And to province
1:53:38 because the system in Vietnam is to change your life,
1:53:44 but I have to,
1:53:45 I have to stop you here because unfortunately,
1:53:48 we are running out of time
1:53:50 and I'm,
1:53:51 I'm really sorry that I'm interrupting you
1:53:53 and we need to yes,
1:53:54 yes.
1:53:55 You are,
1:53:55 yes,
1:53:56 yeah,
1:53:56 well,
1:53:56 the,
1:53:56 the
1:53:57 time is going tense,
1:53:58 so we are trying to,
1:53:59 to keep everyone,
1:54:00 uh,
1:54:01 giving the opportunity to speak to all our distinguished
1:54:03 guests.
1:54:04 I will now move to,
1:54:06 uh,
1:54:06 Francisca.
1:54:07 Thank you,
1:54:08 thank you very much,
1:54:08 Ms.
1:54:09 Hang,
1:54:09 and I will now
1:54:10 move to
1:54:11 our practice manager of health,
1:54:12 Miss,
1:54:12 uh,
1:54:13 Francisca,
1:54:14 um.
1:54:17 Thank you.
1:54:19 Can,
1:54:19 can you hear me?
1:54:22 Can you hear me?
1:54:23 Yes,
1:54:23 yes,
1:54:23 we can.
1:54:24 Yes.
1:54:24 Great.
1:54:25 Thank you.
1:54:25 Uh,
1:54:26 this has been a very rich session and,
1:54:28 uh,
1:54:29 we could obviously have spent a lot more time on this.
1:54:32 The,
1:54:32 the,
1:54:32 the two speakers,
1:54:33 um,
1:54:34 really gave a good oversight of some of the challenges and some of the,
1:54:37 I'll just go quickly over some of the things that I picked from.
1:54:40 The discussions and the,
1:54:42 the,
1:54:42 the speakers as well as the panelists.
1:54:44 Um,
1:54:45 Peter's point about,
1:54:46 uh,
1:54:47 we need to have a multi-sectoral approach to this.
1:54:49 It's not just a legal issue.
1:54:50 It's not just a procurement issue.
1:54:52 We also need to have the technical people as part of this.
1:54:55 And one other important um entity that uh uh uh uh
1:54:59 Carri brought in is the civil society and the journalists,
1:55:02 uh,
1:55:02 because if they're not part of the process and being carried along,
1:55:05 they end up being those that bring out.
1:55:08 Highlight the problems that we face and that is one of the um
1:55:12 issues that we're facing in one of the countries that I face,
1:55:15 that I manage is that uh it's the,
1:55:17 it's the civil societies and the media
1:55:20 that are complaining about how the process,
1:55:22 the procurement process
1:55:23 have not gone very well.
1:55:25 And that the monies have not been used as appropriate and supplies are
1:55:29 sitting in,
1:55:29 in,
1:55:30 in,
1:55:30 in storage and not being utilized,
1:55:33 um,
1:55:33 cost of,
1:55:33 of,
1:55:34 uh,
1:55:34 procurement were too high.
1:55:36 So
1:55:36 the thing is,
1:55:37 it's important to carry the civil society
1:55:39 and the journalists along from the very beginning
1:55:42 so that the more people know about what is going on,
1:55:44 the more people know about the challenges that this,
1:55:46 uh,
1:55:47 the,
1:55:47 the,
1:55:47 the government is facing in this
1:55:50 difficult situation,
1:55:51 the better you are able to carry them along and then
1:55:53 They're also,
1:55:54 they also act as checks and balances for the system.
1:55:57 And the other point that I,
1:55:58 I,
1:55:59 I took from all this is it,
1:56:00 it's not just having emergency procedures and guidelines in place,
1:56:04 but also revisiting them.
1:56:06 On a regular basis,
1:56:07 um,
1:56:08 for pandemic preparedness,
1:56:09 we do what we call simulation.
1:56:11 So you have a plan,
1:56:12 you have an operational plan,
1:56:13 but
1:56:14 at least once or twice in a year you actually
1:56:16 pretend as if there is a pandemic and you
1:56:19 actually go through the process so that all pieces,
1:56:21 all the different parts
1:56:22 of the puzzle actually
1:56:24 have a,
1:56:24 a chance to work through it to see that the system,
1:56:27 the,
1:56:27 the procedures that you have put in place
1:56:29 are working.
1:56:30 Um,
1:56:31 and,
1:56:31 and,
1:56:31 and that's why I would say it's good
1:56:33 to have like a dry run during non-emergency periods
1:56:37 of some of these emergency procedures that we,
1:56:39 we put in place
1:56:41 to be able to fast track a lot of the procurement.
1:56:44 Um,
1:56:44 um,
1:56:44 if we don't do that,
1:56:46 uh,
1:56:46 there's a chance that people who we think are,
1:56:49 are,
1:56:49 are knowledgeable
1:56:50 have forgotten the procedures
1:56:52 and then don't follow it at the time of um um of,
1:56:55 of the emergencies.
1:56:57 Um,
1:56:57 if we're,
1:56:58 if,
1:56:58 if,
1:56:59 if we also have to be
1:57:00 conversant that it's the same set of human resources that are doing things
1:57:04 that maintain the essential services.
1:57:06 Somebody also talked about,
1:57:08 look,
1:57:08 it's not just addressing an emergency at the time.
1:57:10 There are other regular things that need to continue,
1:57:13 but it's the same sets of human resources that have to do everything,
1:57:17 so
1:57:18 they need to be up to speed about
1:57:20 what are the things that they need to do
1:57:22 to maintain essential services and what are those special.
1:57:25 Um,
1:57:26 systems that need to be,
1:57:27 um,
1:57:27 put in place during the emergency procedures.
1:57:30 We had a good set of,
1:57:31 um,
1:57:31 um,
1:57:31 panelists discussing about their experiences in the,
1:57:34 the various countries
1:57:36 and their very rich uh um experiences and I hope people have been able to learn
1:57:40 some things from there and,
1:57:41 and for me,
1:57:42 um,
1:57:42 maybe just to speak about some of the,
1:57:44 um,
1:57:45 um,
1:57:46 situations that we,
1:57:46 we faced,
1:57:47 uh,
1:57:47 uh,
1:57:48 in a few of the countries that I,
1:57:49 I managed
1:57:50 as part of putting the um COVID operations together.
1:57:54 We did in some cases apply the retroactive financing
1:57:58 so that um while the projects were being put in place,
1:58:01 the governments had the leeway to be able to continue with their processes,
1:58:05 um,
1:58:05 making sure that they followed the required rules
1:58:07 so that once the projects were effective,
1:58:09 then it was very easy to um um
1:58:12 um reimburse the government's expenses as part of the,
1:58:15 the,
1:58:15 the,
1:58:16 the,
1:58:16 the grants or the loans for the countries.
1:58:19 There was a lot of use of data and technology to monitor the processes.
1:58:23 In one of the countries that I work on,
1:58:25 and they use that data,
1:58:26 the,
1:58:26 the,
1:58:27 the information they got from that data to constantly
1:58:30 change the operating plans
1:58:33 to make sure that things were going in place.
1:58:36 In other countries they had emergency
1:58:37 procedures that allowed increasing thresholds,
1:58:41 um,
1:58:41 allowed requests for proposals to,
1:58:43 to be made by the same set of suppliers that they are already known.
1:58:48 Because there are lots of cases where um um suppliers that are
1:58:52 not known that are just popping up because taking advantage of the situation
1:58:56 um um
1:58:57 came in to put,
1:58:58 put um requests for proposals um in place.
1:59:00 So using having a set of suppliers that you know can help
1:59:04 at least for those basic things that need to continue
1:59:07 um is a good thing.
1:59:08 Then there was also a lot of direct contracting um,
1:59:11 um,
1:59:11 and,
1:59:12 and using um established firms.
1:59:15 Um,
1:59:15 um,
1:59:15 and,
1:59:16 and then
1:59:16 also making sure that the media and the civil
1:59:19 societies are carried along like I mentioned before.
1:59:22 So this has been a very rich experience and I thank everybody for,
1:59:25 for,
1:59:25 for helping me to learn about these experiences as well.
1:59:28 Um,
1:59:28 and I look forward to any,
1:59:30 um,
1:59:30 um,
1:59:31 questions that come up.
1:59:32 Unfortunately,
1:59:32 I might have to disconnect in about a minute or two,
1:59:35 but thank you very much.
1:59:36 Thank you,
1:59:36 thank you very much.
1:59:37 Cesca,
1:59:37 thank you
1:59:39 for your thoughts.
1:59:40 And now we are going to take
1:59:41 two questions,
1:59:42 but all the questions will be responded in our,
1:59:44 uh,
1:59:45 blog.
1:59:45 So please continue posing your question.
1:59:47 We will make sure that every single question is is responded.
1:59:50 I saw Mr.
1:59:51 Trete that was very active responding,
1:59:53 uh,
1:59:54 through live chatting
1:59:55 with our participants.
1:59:56 Now we have
1:59:58 one question for,
1:59:59 uh,
1:59:59 Carre.
2:00:00 If you can help us,
2:00:01 uh,
2:00:02 with,
2:00:02 with this question,
2:00:03 it's still realistic to consider COVID-19 pandemic as an emergency situation.
2:00:08 Isn't it time for countries to set
2:00:10 more realistic short to medium term procurement strategies
2:00:14 or visions in response
2:00:16 to COVID-19
2:00:17 instead of continuing to work under emergencies
2:00:20 crisis situation?
2:00:26 Sure,
2:00:26 I,
2:00:26 I wish I had a,
2:00:28 a clear answer to that.
2:00:29 I think as Peter mentioned in the chat,
2:00:31 that is definitely the million-dollar question.
2:00:34 Um,
2:00:34 but it's something that we're actively thinking about as we start to transition,
2:00:38 I guess,
2:00:39 to thinking about this as a longer-term problem
2:00:41 and then also eventually to the recovery.
2:00:43 Um,
2:00:44 but something to echo what Ayo was just saying,
2:00:47 um,
2:00:47 I think one of the key things that we've seen is that there is a,
2:00:51 a positive role that civil society can actually play.
2:00:54 In the process itself.
2:00:56 Um,
2:00:57 I think some of the recommendations that I mentioned,
2:01:00 um,
2:01:00 and,
2:01:00 and we put up,
2:01:01 um,
2:01:03 included in my slide,
2:01:04 and we also have a full blog about it that I'm happy to share.
2:01:06 Um,
2:01:07 for inclusion in,
2:01:08 in the follow-up,
2:01:09 um,
2:01:10 but some of those
2:01:11 recommendations such as having
2:01:13 clear policies that are sort of published and open and
2:01:16 everyone is on the same page about what's happening,
2:01:19 having open data that people can access,
2:01:22 everyone can mute if it's not talking,
2:01:24 we have a lot of interferences.
2:01:26 OK,
2:01:26 thank you,
2:01:27 sorry.
2:01:31 No,
2:01:31 no worries.
2:01:32 Um,
2:01:33 But I think some of these,
2:01:35 um,
2:01:37 Some of these key recommendations that have come out in the context of COVID
2:01:41 are relevant
2:01:42 anytime,
2:01:43 even when it's not in a pandemic.
2:01:45 Um,
2:01:45 and I think that's something important to,
2:01:47 to recognize.
2:01:48 Um,
2:01:49 the clearest thing that we've seen is countries that
2:01:52 are already implementing open contracting that have open data
2:01:56 that different actors are able to use and analyze.
2:01:59 They've been able
2:02:00 to react better
2:02:02 in the face of the pandemic,
2:02:03 um,
2:02:04 but that continues
2:02:05 even in normal times as well.
2:02:07 So I think a lot of the recommendations that have come up today
2:02:10 are relevant,
2:02:11 even when it's not a,
2:02:13 an emergency,
2:02:14 urgent emergency situation.
2:02:18 Thanks.
2:02:20 Thank you,
2:02:21 Carol.
2:02:21 Thank you.
2:02:22 I,
2:02:22 we will now,
2:02:23 uh,
2:02:24 have a
2:02:25 question for Ms.
2:02:25 Lee.
2:02:26 I,
2:02:26 I don't know if Ms.
2:02:27 Lee is still online.
2:02:29 Is it clear,
2:02:29 can you hear us?
2:02:36 There was a specific question about France and how they use
2:02:40 types of verification,
2:02:42 what types of verification they requested from the buyers.
2:02:48 Is the flu?
2:02:54 Well,
2:02:54 um,
2:02:55 I think that all the,
2:02:56 all our questions can be
2:02:59 asked
2:02:59 in,
2:03:00 in blog.
2:03:00 hello?
2:03:02 I think it's.
2:03:06 We
2:03:09 Could you please repeat the question?
2:03:10 Thank you.
2:03:10 Yes,
2:03:11 it would be interesting to know what types of verification was requested from buyer
2:03:15 on the use of purchasing procurement.
2:03:18 We are struggling to measure the impact of COVID-19 financing.
2:03:22 So what kind of verification was,
2:03:23 were requested from buyers?
2:03:31 Uh.
2:03:37 I'm not exactly sure which type of verification
2:03:42 uh you're referring to specifically,
2:03:44 but buyers mainly had to provide
2:03:48 uh
2:03:49 uh verification.
2:03:59 Uh,
2:03:59 that had to do with protecting workers' health and environmental,
2:04:04 uh,
2:04:05 considerations.
2:04:07 I'm not sure if those are the types of verification that you were,
2:04:11 uh,
2:04:11 referring to.
2:04:17 Everyone that had this kind of question,
2:04:19 they can further develop in the chat and then we can
2:04:22 uh
2:04:23 continue to respond to this question afterwards.
2:04:26 Now,
2:04:26 as this session unfortunately is coming to an end,
2:04:30 I would kindly ask Cuba to summarize,
2:04:33 to give her final conclusion on the event.
2:04:35 Thank you.
2:04:39 Thank you very much,
2:04:40 uh,
2:04:40 Maniola for excellent moderating of this session.
2:04:44 Uh,
2:04:45 it's very difficult to summarize,
2:04:47 but,
2:04:48 uh,
2:04:48 of course,
2:04:49 we all learn from each other.
2:04:51 Um,
2:04:53 when is it an emergency and when uh
2:04:56 governments could possibly start planning for these emergencies.
2:05:00 The pandemic started as an emergency,
2:05:02 but now
2:05:03 we know the,
2:05:04 the,
2:05:05 the needs.
2:05:06 We know
2:05:07 uh that after the,
2:05:09 the first procurement for
2:05:12 uh protection of health,
2:05:14 uh,
2:05:14 there is a procurement for vaccines,
2:05:17 so this can be planned.
2:05:19 Um,
2:05:20 we learned from our speaker.
2:05:22 that uh
2:05:23 while we work on expedited procedures,
2:05:27 we still have room to be transparent,
2:05:30 to use
2:05:30 open contracting data um
2:05:33 uh forms uh to,
2:05:36 to verify the impact of the procurement,
2:05:39 whether it reached its intended beneficiaries.
2:05:43 Um,
2:05:44 there is a lot of experiences that we learned from the different,
2:05:48 uh,
2:05:48 esteemed speakers and panelists.
2:05:51 Uh,
2:05:51 and I hope that this discussion among procurement
2:05:56 practitioners,
2:05:57 academicians,
2:05:58 and government officials
2:06:00 continue,
2:06:01 uh,
2:06:02 before,
2:06:02 uh,
2:06:04 ending this session,
2:06:05 which we're 6 minutes
2:06:08 overdue.
2:06:09 Uh,
2:06:10 I want to thank,
2:06:11 uh,
2:06:11 Nagaraju who is chairing the
2:06:14 community of practice for procurement for development.
2:06:20 And thank
2:06:21 Manola for organizing this and thank you
2:06:24 all esteemed speakers and panelists for participating with us.
2:06:28 I look forward for more collaboration with all of you,
2:06:31 maybe on different topics.
2:06:33 And thanks,
2:06:34 we will
2:06:35 uh distribute.
2:06:36 And uh circulate the,
2:06:38 the minutes of uh
2:06:40 this session and probably a,
2:06:42 a blog later that we can
2:06:44 um uh email it to all of you.
2:06:47 Thank you very much and stay safe.
2:06:49 Hopefully,
2:06:50 this pandemic will end soon for all of us.
2:06:57 Well,
2:06:57 thank you,
2:06:58 thank you very much.
2:06:59 Thank you too.
2:07:00 Thank you.
2:07:01 Many thanks everyone.
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