The Government has approved new measures to increase transparency in the field of public procurement. Under the new rules, procurement plans and reports on contract execution will be published on the electronic platform of the Information System “State Register of Public Procurement.” At present, this information is published separately on the websites of individual institutions, while some authorities do not have their own websites. Under the new amendments, the information will be available in a single system.

The new rules also provide that the central procurement authority will be able to request the completion, revision or updating of submitted information when it is incomplete, contradictory or insufficiently substantiated.

Another new provision is that the procurement plan must be approved within ten days of the institution’s budget being approved and published within five working days on the contracting authority’s official website, under the “Public Procurement” section, as well as in the Information System “State Register of Public Procurement.” The provisional procurement plan will be published within five working days of its approval.

From now on, any amendments to the procurement plan must be properly documented by the procurement working group, while the revised version of the plan must be approved by the chair of the working group and published in the manner described above within five working days of approval.

As a businessperson who has firsthand experience with public procurement in the Republic of Moldova, I can say that these changes are genuinely positive and that, as a result, the level of transparency will indeed increase. However, these changes alone cannot solve the major problems that exist in the public procurement sector. Personally, I believe that the Government should move forward in this direction with concrete measures aimed at making the verification of bids submitted by those offering their services in public procurement procedures much more effective.

For example, in order to win a tender, some bidders indicate technical parameters that are incorrect or do not exist at all. The legislation then allows them to change these parameters after the tender has already been won, creating considerable room for abuse by decision-makers who may enter into arrangements with certain bidders.

The “lowest price” criterion should also be eliminated. In many cases, applying this criterion results in the contracting of poor-quality services. The focus should be on quality and efficiency, rather than price.

The Government should also consider tougher penalties for corruption offenses related to public procurement in order to deter various opportunists who have turned public procurement into profitable business ventures for themselves.

There are many other relevant measures that could potentially be taken in this context. What is important is that the Government does not limit itself to the measures already introduced, which are primarily aimed at increasing transparency in public procurement. This should only be a first step, followed by others. Only then will we be able to speak of fair and efficient public procurement and tendering.

Victor Slivinschi, entrepreneur and founder of Turboenergy Power