e-GP system hailed

Electronic government procurement (e-GP) is a modern and integrated online system for procurement of goods, work and services with public funds by the government procuring entities. The government deserves appreciation for digitising public procurement that involves about Tk 780 billion of the total development budget a year.

Tenderers, representatives of procuring entities, and the media came up with such observations at three workshops held in Tangail, Sherpur and Jamalpur districts from July 28 to 30, 2015.   

The Central Procurement Technical Unit (CPTU) of Implementation Monitoring and Evaluation (IME) Division under the Ministry of Planning in cooperation with Bangladesh Centre for Communication Programmes (BCCP) organised the e-GP awareness workshops under the auspices of the Public Procurement Reform Project-II supported by the World Bank.

The objective of the workshops to be held in all 64 districts of Bangladesh is to enhance awareness and understanding about e-GP to facilitate its adoption across the government and private tenderers.

Tenderers in the workshops demanded training for themselves on e-GP operation so that they can easily participate in the tendering process. They also demanded easier and updated versions of various technical applications in the online procuring system hosted at www.eprocure.gov.bd.

Expressing satisfaction, representatives of the procuring entities said that the online procurement system is a great relief for them as they can work now without any hindrance and influence of any quarters. It saves time and costs and facilitates wider and fair competition.

To ensure best value for public money and enhance transparency, accountability, equal treatment to all concerned and fair competition Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina inaugurated the national e-GP portal on June 2, 2011. The guideline for e-GP was also declared the same year in line with Public Procurement Act (PPA-2006). E-GP was first piloted in four key target agencies under the PPRP-II. These are Local Government and Engineering Department (LGED), Roads and Highways Department (RHD), Bangladesh Water Development Board (BWDB) and Bangladesh Rural Electrification Board (BREB).

Until July 26, 2015, a total of 1949 procuring entities of 98 agencies under 24 ministries including the four target ones conducted their procurement through e-GP. A total of 26787 tenders had been invited under e-GP and more than 15 thousand tenderers registered in e-GP for tendering. The CPTU have signed MoUs with 39 banks having over 1700 branches for receiving registration, renewal and document fees from the tenderers.