2017 Conference on Responsible Public Procurement – Strategic Approach to Public Procurement

Expert Conference was organized by the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs and the Ministry of Agriculture under the auspices of Pavel Bělobrádek, Deputy Prime Minister for the Science, Research and Innovation and the Ministry for Regional Development, and took place on September 19, 2017, at Lichtenštejnský Palace, Prague.

Program:

9:30 Registration, coffee

10:00 Opening remarks

13:30 Panel discussion: Implementing responsible public procurement in an organization. Responsible public procurement cannot be done on a hit-or-miss basis. It requires a pilot phase followed by internal strategies and processes in which the contracting authority embeds the notion of taking a responsible approach. This includes deciding on the priority issues that the organization will focus on, choosing suitable procurements for those issues, managing contracts, and evaluating them. The members of the first panel are public procurement experts whose organizations have implemented responsible public procurement. Key questions for discussion: Which priority issues does your organization focus on? How did you decide on the selection of those issues? What is the link between the issues selected and your organization’s strategic priorities?Have you set any measurable goals to do with the issues selected in your responsible public procurement strategy? What are your experiences in implementing responsible public procurement in your organization? How do you educate and motivate employees? What are the main challenges you have had to overcome? How do you evaluate outcomes?

Panellists: Martin Hadaš (Masaryk Univerzity), Tomáš Havlíček (Vltava Basin Management), Petra Jungová (Palacký Univerzity Olomouc), Martin Koníček (The South Moravian Region), Tim Rudin (Transport for London, Great Britain)

11:45 Coffee break

12:15 Panel discussion: The effectiveness of responsible public procurement and measuring its Impact. Is responsible public procurement beneficial but more expensive? Or does it bring real value for money? Either view could be right, depending upon the priorities of the contracting authority and its approach to responsible public procurement, which might be systematic and strategic or might simply be random and disorganized. The second panel will involve experts with experience in measuring and evaluating the impact of responsible public procurement. Key questions for the discussion: Is responsible public procurement more expensive? Should tenders be evaluated for inefficiency by the controlling authority? Can social value be measured? If so, how? How can we evaluate responsible public procurement from a 3E perspective (economy, efficiency, effectiveness)?

Panellists: Jaroslav Kračún (Innovative and e-procurement unit, DG Grow, European Commission), Barbora Janíčková (the Ministry of Finance of the Czech Republic), Jiří Skuhrovec (EconLab z.s.), Sarah Ireland (London Borough of Croydon, Great Britain)

13:30 Award for the implementation of responsible public procurement in the Czech Republic

14:00 Lunch

15:00 Panel discussion: Responsible public procurement – the best practice in European countries. Public authorities in many European countries are cognizant of the impact public procurement and therefore use public funds strategically to support the solution of various social and environmental problems. Their years of involvement with responsible public procurement mean panellists will have experience to share in discussing best practices.

Panellists: Tim Rudin (Transport for London, Great Britain), Anne Cathrine Jacobsen (DIFI – Agency for Public Management and eGovernment, Norway), Tomasz Pactwa (City of Warsaw, Poland).

16:30 Conference closing, glass of wine, networking

Program also here.

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