Statement of Work
Public procurement risk assessment and monitoring
BACKGROUND
The Improving Public Procurement project (the Project), implemented by Deloitte Consulting LLP, is a five-year United States Agency for International Development-funded activity initiated in July 2022, with the overall objective to strengthen institutional capacities for management and oversight of a fair, open, non-discriminatory and transparent public procurement process at the national and local levels. The Project is structured around four components focused on 1) improving local procurement planning, 2) improving procurement procedures across the entire procurement lifecycle in accordance with international standards, 3) improving capacities for effective legal enforcement and 4) increasing effectiveness of public procurement oversight. The Project counterparts include local self-governments (LSGs), the Public Procurement Office (PPO), the Commission for Protection of Bidders’ Rights (Commission), Public Prosecutors Offices, Administrative Courts, Misdemeanor Courts, Anti-corruption Judicial Units, the State Audit Institution (SAI) and civil society organizations.
The Project’s strategy is to enhance the implementation of existing laws, policies, and procedures and to support the alignment of the public procurement ecosystem to international standards and good practices. The Project will facilitate the identification of locally-led solutions that cut across government, business, and civil society, to create space for stakeholders to collaborate across institutional boundaries. The Project will emphasize the professionalization of the procurement function through trainings, the development of tools, and identification of leading practices. It will support improved coordination among institutions leading to increased oversight to identify procurement irregularities for prosecution and adjudication; legislature engagement to resolve identified weaknesses in the law, and working at national and local levels of government to increase capacity from various angles and capacity building of civil society organizations to contribute to oversight and communication to the public.
One of the Project’s key goals is to support the PPO and LSGs to identify and mitigate risks of irregularities and corruption in public procurement processes at the local level. The risk of noncompliance with regulation is significant at the local level due to weak capacities of municipalities as well as to shortage of efficient monitoring tools and skills. In order to assist LSGs to upgrade their internal public procurement monitoring capacities as well as to help national regulatory bodies to improve efficiency of their external control of LSGs public procurement, the Project will develop effective mechanisms for both internal and external monitoring and control at the local level. That requires identification of corruption and irregularities i.e. “red flags” in the at all stages in the lifecycle of public procurement.
Beside upgrading monitoring mechanisms, the Project aims to assist in improving of monitoring instruments for the Public Procurement Office, as the national level institution responsible for policy making and monitoring public procurements up to the point of contract signing. One of the key functions of the Public Procurement e-Portal. apart from increasing transparency and economy of public procurement processes, is to assist oversight bodies in monitoring and control of public procurement at both national and local level. One of the prerequisites for increasing usefulness and efficiency of the e-Portal as a monitoring instrument is to determine how information that is maintained in the portal may be used more effectively by the PPO, misdemeanor courts, prosecutors and other interested parties to monitor and control purchasing of contracting authorities. This activity will focus on design and development of a strategy for local level authorities and the Public Procurement Office to better detect and mitigate irregularities or “hot spots” in the public procurement office. The desired outcome is for authorities at the local and the PPO to have a reliable tool and fact-based methodology to identify “red flags” to enable risk-based monitoring of public spending on procurements.
SCOPE OF TECHNICAL ASSISTANCEIdentification of “red flags” throughout the lifecycle of public procurement requires preparation of a Procurement Process Risk Assessment. The document should include baseline assessment of “hotspots” in the procurement process. The Risk Assessment should cover the lifecycle of the public procurement process starting from planning through contract execution and is expected to present the most common forms of irregularities in public procurement processes at the level of municipalities
The assessment should provide a comprehensive description of: the procurement process at the local level according to the Public Procurement Law and by-laws; levels of officials involved in decision making; processes used to conduct market research in preparation for tenders; commonly used bidder selection criteria; procedures for evaluation of bids and negotiation; and internal controls exercised in management and monitoring of contract execution. The expert should describe the types of data that LSGs are required to submit for each phase of procurement cycle into the e-Portal. The expert’s report should also detail the procedures and data that PPO uses to monitor and control the processes up to contract signing. The assessment should 1) identify the most frequently identified irregularities and violations of the Public Procurement Law and by-laws; 2) evaluate how irregularities can be detected and what patterns of behavior or signs indicate violation of regulations; 3) categorize irregularities thus enabling distinctions to be made between formal (administrative) mistakes and those that should be treated as misuse of public funds; and 4) detect what weaknesses of procedures and/or frailty of monitoring and control mechanisms enabled the irregularities.
The expert should take into consideration in the Risk Assessment Report the findings, recommendations and reporting by the SAI, the Standing Conference of Cities and Municipalities (SCCM), Commission for Protection of Bidders Rights (CPBR), Agency for Prevention of Corruption Integrity Plans, civil society organizations, the PPO including data in the e-Portal, as well as information collected from selected LSGs. Responses and actions taken in response to these institutions’ reports should be considered. The Project is also conducting rapid assessments of public procurement processes in 14 LSGs selected as partner institutions concurrent with this activity. The expert should closely coordinate with the Project team and utilize the results of the LSG rapid assessments as input into the Risk Assessment Report. Expert’s assessment should determine how the identified risks should be mitigated at the local level and by PPO to reduce irregularities throughout the public procurement life cycle. For example, the assessment report may recommend, but not be limited to, strengthening specific financial management and internal control policies or procedures, enhancement of by-laws, data augmentation to e-Portal, etc.
The expert should produce a risk matrix for local authorities and the PPO to use in detecting “red flags” in the procurement process that would indicate the need for greater attention to particular procurement-related actions. The matrix should enable identification of various types of irregularities with estimated frequency for each of them (high, medium, low), combined with significance of the risk (high, medium and low), and level of difficulty to detect irregularities with monitoring mechanisms based on existing regulation (high, medium, low). The findings would provide useful inputs when establishing priorities for PPO and LSG monitoring and addressing procurement “hotspots”. The evaluation of risks should cover 1) internal mechanisms of monitoring and control that have already been applied in selected LSGs; 2) actual organizational models of procurement function, levels of decentralization, hierarchies in decision-making; 3) distribution of tasks and potential conflicts among those who are accountable for procurement (officials), those who are responsible for public procurement (public procurement officers and persons assigned for technical aspects of procurement) as well as those who benefit from procurement (end users); and 4) motivation mechanisms for public procurement officers.
The Law on Public Procurement introduced public procurement monitoring as a new competence for the PPO in 2020. The results of the public procurement process risk assessment can be used as a basis for developing predictive risk metrics for PPO to detect irregularities in the procurement process by using the e-Portal as a monitoring tool. As importantly, the risk metrics could serve as a source of information to support PPO’s mitigation of risks of corruption by enhancing its ability to take proactive measures to guard against transgressions by bidders or contracting authorities while using the e-Portal as a monitoring tool. The PPO already uses a set of indicators applied to data collected in the e-Portal. In order to increase the utility of the e-Portal as a monitoring tool for the PPO, it is necessary to evaluate availability of additional data that may be helpful as well as possibilities to correlate data in order to develop additional indicators or metrics. The expert is expected to prepare a report on E-portal as an efficient tool for PPO monitoring of public procurement. The report should include an analysis of the E-portal from the prospective of detecting irregularities and fraud in public procurements. In addition to an assessment of current features and data available on E-portal, the report should encompass recommendations on how to increase its transparency.
PERIOD OF PERFORMANCEThe performance period is from January 9, 2023, until April 14, 2023.
PLACE OF PERFORMANCEThe work will be performed in Belgrade, Serbia.
DELIVERABLESSpecific deliverables include the following:
· Methodology for Procurement Risk Assessment. The Methodology should include the following: 1) clear statement of objectives, scope and methodology for the risk assessment; 2) identification of sources of information and data to be collected to assess present risks in public procurement processes at the local level; 3) statement of limitations of data availability; and 4) description of techniques to be used for data analysis. The methodology should also include collection of data from stakeholders engaged in the public procurement process. The data should be drawn from two co-creation workshops facilitated with the Project to include LSGs, PPO, SKGO and CSOs to identify themes and key areas of weakness based on risks in the procurement process. The expert is expected to submit the proposed draft methodology for review and comments by the Project team prior to finalization. The Methodology should apply a comprehensive approach that would encompass analysis of the lifecycle of the public procurement process at municipal level including contract execution phase.
· Public Procurement Process Risk Assessment and Report. The expert is expected to conduct a process risk assessment and produce a report in draft for review and concurrence by the Project. The report should include a risk matrix or risk determination tool applicable for local contracting authorities and PPO use to detect red flags in the public procurement process The report should not exceed 25 pages, any excluding annexes.
· Report on PPO Methodology for Monitoring. The expert is expected to produce a report with a methodology and recommendations to enhance PPO’s use of data in the e-Portal to enhance PPO’s monitoring of public procurement contracting consistent with the provision of the Public Procurement Law. The expert should present a draft report for Project review and work closely with the Project staff and PPO representatives to finalize the report.
SCHEDULE OF DELIVERABLESTechnical assistance shall be delivered as follows:
Deliverable
Due Date
Methodology for Procurement Risk Assessment (in Serbian and English)
January 27, 2023
Public procurement Process Risk Assessment and Report (maximum 25 pages in Serbian, with the executive summary that will include key findings and recommendations in English)
March 31, 2023
Report on Methodology for PPO Monitoring (in Serbian, with the executive summary in English)
April 14, 2023
QUALIFICATIONSNOTE: These are cumulative qualifications that can be met by one or multiple individuals included in the proposal.
This is a Senior level position.
Education:
Master’s degree or higher in economics, law, public administration, finance or another relevant field.
Job knowledge and work experience:
Minimum of 10 years of professional-level experience in evaluation research including experience risk assessment methodologies;
Minimum of 5 years of relevant work with local self-governments;
Knowledge of the public procurement system in Serbia (legal and institutional framework, practices, international standards and requirements).
Knowledge of local government administration, and governance.
Language Proficiency:
Serbian and English language proficiency required
Skills and Abilities:
Strong evaluation, analytical and communication skills;
Ability to use various computer software (e.g. PowerPoint, Word, Excel) and online platforms.
Ability to provide an efficient presentation of practices, tools, and challenges to various audiences.
Excellent presentation and communication skills.
Instructions to Offerors
Offerors must:
1) Agree to the completion dates.
2) Submit a curriculum vitae(s) and a cover letter describing directly relevant experience
with references.
3) Submit a financial offer for the assignment (in US dollars) presented per deliverable (see
table below).
When calculating the financial offer, the offeror should include all anticipated costs for
the assignment such as labor, travel, accommodation, and Defense Base Act insurance.
Please be advised, DBA insurance is mandatory for all subcontractors at their expense.
DBA insurance is 2% of labor costs. DBA insurance cannot be added to the cost
afterwards or be reimbursed.
Any airfares should be for the lowest cost economy class and Fly America compliant.
4) The application should reflect the contracting party – entity or individual, the subcontract
will be signed with the entity/individual indicated in the application.
5) Offers should be submitted electronically to IPP Project Office in Belgrade, Serbia, to the
email address: office@boljenabavke.com, no later than 5pm CET on December 28, 2022.
NOTE: Submission of a CV(s) alone IS NOT a complete application. An application must include a Financial Offer in a format provided within the Scope of Work. Failure to provide the required information will result in your not being considered for this assignment.
Requests for clarifications may be sent to office@boljenabavke.com by 5pm. CET on December 20, 2022.
The clarifications for all questions received will be circulated to all interested parties via email no later than 5pm. CET on December 26, 2022.
About Deloitte:
For more than 25 years, Deloitte’s International Development Organization (IDO) practice has worked with governments, development agencies, NGOs, and private firms in over 60 countries to build the institutions, legal framework, and policies required for effective public and private sector growth.
Deloitte is a leading provider of innovative development solutions to development agencies, foundations, governments, and Fortune 500 companies. Our dedicated IDO team is the vanguard for the delivery of profound impact in the global development space in alignment to the UN's Sustainable Development Goals. With more than 1000 development experts around the world, Deloitte has implemented over 150 donor projects worth a total of more than $3 billion in more than 70 countries.
