The first part of this blog post presented findings about Georgian companies’ participation in the state procurement system. This post provides an overview of companies representatives’ assessments of the state procurement system and how these assessments differ depending upon the company’s participation or non-participation in the state procurement process.
Company representatives report that their main sources of information about state procurement include the websites of procuring state entities (17%) and the State Procurement Agency’s Unified Electronic System (16%). However, representatives of companies that do not participate in state procurement report that they do not or cannot get information about the state entities’ procurement tenders.
Note: The number of answer options was not limited during the interviews.
Most companies (60%) report trusting the State Procurement Agency, with only a small share (8%) saying they do not trust it. At the same time, almost a third of companies (30%) say they don’t know whether they trust the Agency or not. Notably, representatives of companies which have never bid on state procurement tenders answer “don’t know” more frequently than representatives of companies that have. Moreover, representatives of the companies which have participated in the state procurement process at least once report trusting the Agency more often than the non-participating companies. This result likely indicates that the participating companies’ experiences working with the State Procurement Agency were positive.
Responses to the question, “How much do you agree or disagree that companies which have connections with the government win tenders?” also vary based on whether companies have experience participating in the state procurement system. Representatives of companies that have such experience disagree with this statement more often. Moreover, representatives of companies which have not participated in the state procurement system respond “don’t know” twice as often as participating companies.
Around one third (36%) of the companies that have participated in state procurement think that tenders are often “tailored” to one specific company and the goal is to ensure that this particular company wins. However, almost half (48%) of the participating companies do not agree with this statement. While 27% of the companies which have participated in the state procurement system agree with the statement that tenders may be repeatedly rejected by the procuring side with the aim of awarding the contract to a particular company through simplified tender, almost half disagree with this statement.
Note: This question was asked to the representatives of the 17% of companies that have participated in the state procurement system.
As the findings presented in this blog post show, representatives of companies that have participated in the state procurement system at least once assess the State Procurement Agency’s work more positively. Most of them trust the Agency and believe that there is no need to have connections with the government to win tenders. Most representatives of companies that have not participated in the state procurement system have difficulty stating their opinion on these issues. The findings presented in this blog post indicate that the State Procurement Agency should do more to raise awareness among companies about the state procurement system.
To explore this topic more, take a look at CRRC-Georgia’s report Survey of companies on state procurement.
