The World Bank will soon begin disclosing more about contracts valued at more than $250,000.
The information – contractor name, a brief description of services and the contract amount — will be published on the World Bank Group’s Open Finances website.
The new disclosures, to be done quarterly, will begin Oct. 1, covering the period beginning July 1.
Covered will be contracts let by the World Bank’s General Services’ Corporate Procurement Division These involve both “administrative procurement” and “operations consulting”
The Administrative Procurement website contains solicitations for goods, services and works requirements with an estimated value above $250,000. One contact with a July bid date is for “Software Development, Maintenance and Support for the Government of Bangladesh.” The information is minimal, with the full detail available to qualified bidders.
The site does not display solicitations for Operations Consulting site except to approved vendors on the eConsultant2 system.
A new note on the site says:
The World Bank Group reserves the right to publicly disclose contract award information, including but not limited to, name of the vendor receiving the award, a brief description of services, and contract award amount, for any contract award valued over US $250,000 made after July 1, 2013. Offeror’s proposal and contractual documents will remain confidential and therefore not subject to disclosure.
More broadly, the Bank is conducting an “open contracting pilot program” to change national-level practices. It is “designed to build borrower and citizen capacity to develop an open contracting ecosystem, where all government information on public expenditures is freely available in machine-readable formats.” More information is also available on this website.
Filed under: IFTI Watch