Public Procurement Service launches 'Public Procurement Field Difficulty Regulation Discovery Contest'

2024.09.23. The Fair Economy — The Public Procurement Service announced on the 23rd that it will hold the '2024 Public Procurement Field Difficulty Regulation Discovery Contest' to identify and resolve regulatory improvement tasks from the perspective of citizens and companies.

The public procurement market, worth 209 trillion won annually, involves more than 570,000 procurement companies and over 70,000 demand agencies. The contest will be conducted by allowing anyone—citizens, businesses or government officials—to identify various inconveniences arising in the procurement field and propose improvement ideas.

The contest will run from the 23rd to the 22nd of next month for one month via the Public Procurement Service website, and outstanding submissions will receive a Public Procurement Service commendation along with a modest prize.

Meanwhile, this year the Public Procurement Service formulated a regulatory innovation plan based on comprehensive on-site opinion gathering. The plan covers 'killer regulations' that have remained unresolved for a long time due to involvement of multiple ministries and sharp conflicts of interest, as well as hidden outdated practices in the field. As a result, 66 out of 102 tasks had been completed as of September.

Consequently, the stamp duty burden on procurement contracts has been reduced by half, and the reduction in the number of intermediate inspections for multiple-award schedule (MAS) contracts has alleviated the paperwork burden for about 10,000 companies, among other achievements. The Public Procurement Service plans to swiftly implement the remaining about 30 unfinished tasks by revising public procurement laws and regulations.

Lim Gi-geun, head of the Public Procurement Service, said, "Field-level public procurement innovation is possible when alternatives are prepared from the perspective of citizens and companies based on active public participation," and added, "We hope this contest will serve as an opportunity to eliminate unreasonable regulations hidden in the public procurement field and create a dynamic procurement market full of vitality, so we ask for your interest and participation."