Government Procurement Policy Board – Technical Support Office (GPPB-TSO) Executive Director Rowena Candice M. Ruiz was invited by the Korean Public Procurement Service and World Bank in the East Asia and Pacific Regional Public Procurement Forum with a theme, ” Accelerating Sustainable Development through Sustainable Public Procurement” at the Grand Hyatt Seoul Hotel, Republic of Korea, from 7 to 9 May 2024.

This forum is a multi-stakeholder meeting for learning and sharing experiences among public procurement agencies in countries that implement public procurement, organized through a collaboration between the Public Procurement Service Korea (PPS Korea) and the World Bank, supported by the Asian Development Bank, the Climate Support Facility, the New Development Bank, the Islamic Development Bank, GIZ, and procurement agencies from countries that conduct public procurement.

The three-day forum discussed eight main topics: the roadmap for Sustainable Public Procurement (SPP), stakeholder support for SPP, experiences promoting SMEs through SPP, gender-responsive procurement, monitoring and evaluating the impact of SPP, capacity building in SPP, the utilization of electronic procurement for SPP implementation, and how SPP can contribute to carbon emission reduction.

During the Forum, ED Ruiz shared the Philippine’s journey towards sustainable public procurement. She emphasized the importance to implement the goal of using the procurement effectively towards achieving the sustainable development goals. “It is easy to commit to some policies, targets, and commitments but at the end of the day what matters is actually how you deliver on this”, ED Ruiz said.

ED Ruiz also emphasized the importance of policy with having all these strategies and roadmaps to ensure harmonious implementations of priorities, which countries agrees for themselves to be implemented. She added that the success of these strategies and policies could only be measured to their successful implementation. Ultimately, she shared that the results delivered on the ground will be the measure of the success of these policies.

The three-day forum with the participation of over 110 procurement experts from 18 countries in the region and from multilateral development banks, is an invaluable platform for exchanging ideas, exploring innovative approaches, putting knowledge to action, and fostering collaborations that will drive forward the agenda of sustainability in public procurement processes.

To know more about the forum, you may visit The World Bank’s website @ https://www.worldbank.org/…/accelerating-sustainable…

To watch the full video of ED Ruiz presentation at YouTube @ Trends in SPP & Topic 1 Are Roadmaps, Strategies, and Policies Essential for Effective SPP. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jRJb_rT6p-Y

For the copy of ED Ruiz’ presentation, you may download @ https://thedocs.worldbank.org/…/Topic-1-Are-Roadmaps…