KATHMANDU, Aug 10: Public procurement is to be advanced as the main agenda for public financial management reforms.
As effectiveness in procurement does not only increase capital expenditure but also expedites development works, public procurement has been considered a crucial aspect of financial management. Secretary of the Public Procurement Monitoring Office, Dr Damodar Regmi said efforts were made to advance public procurement as a major agenda of public financial management.
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"Public procurement itself is a technical and complicated subject having participation of multiple stakeholders. So, there is a need for continuous consultation and collaboration,” Dr Regmi added. Preparation of a simplified guideline is a must to ease understanding of all public agencies to ensure effective implementation of procurement laws.
Secretary Dr Regmi further stressed the need to develop a simplified version of procurement guideline so as to develop procurement capacity at the local level. In a bid to make the public procurement related work procedure, process and decisions further transparent, objective and credible, there needs competition, fairness, honesty, accountability and credibility.
"The procurement office will roll out a training program to improve procurement efficiency of the public agencies in the current fiscal year to make their procurement units competent. In this connection, the office will conduct training at province and local levels to enhance their procurement capacity," he said. Experimenting the concept of procurement clinic, the procurement monitoring office will intensively impart such training to all local governments, he added.
(RSS)
