<p style="margin: 15px 0px; font-size: 14px;"><span style="color: #000000;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: tahoma, arial, helvetica, sans-serif;">SKOPJE, 20 June 2017 – Today, the Center for Civil Communications published its monitoring report on public procurements organized by institutions at local level. </span></span></span></p>
<p style="margin: 15px 0px; font-size: 14px;"><span style="color: #000000;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: tahoma, arial, helvetica, sans-serif;">Key findings include:</span></span></span></p>
<p style="margin: 15px 0px; font-size: 14px;"><span style="color: #000000;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: tahoma, arial, helvetica, sans-serif;">- The already low competition in tender procedures organized on local level continues to decline. Monitored tender procedures were marked by an average participation of 2.4 bidding companies, while 35% of tender procedures were presented with only one bid or no bids. For comparison purposes, in the previous reporting period the average number of bidding companies per tender procedures accounted for 2.8, while 29% of tender procedures were presented with only one bid or no bids. </span></span></span></p>
<p style="margin: 15px 0px;"><span style="color: #000000;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: tahoma, arial, helvetica, sans-serif;">- Although duration of tender procedures is extended, companies have shorter deadlines for development and submission of their bids. In most cases, contracting authorities set the minimum law-stipulated deadline for bid submission. However, unlike these calendar-based deadlines, the actual deadlines for companies to develop and submit their bids are much shorter. There are cases in which companies have only had one day to develop and submit their bids. </span></span></span></p>
<p style="margin: 15px 0px;"><span style="color: #000000;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: tahoma, arial, helvetica, sans-serif;">- The share of tender annulments in the monitoring sample remains at the same high level of 18%. Dominant reasons indicated for annulment of public procurements include high prices and absence of bidding companies in tender procedures.</span></span></span></p>
<p style="margin: 15px 0px; font-size: 14px;"><span style="color: #000000;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: tahoma, arial, helvetica, sans-serif;">- Although they are mandatory for all procurements, e-auctions were organized in only 55% of monitored tender procedures. On the contrary, the share of so-called e-procurements or tender procedures fully organized in electronic manner accounted for 58%. The average price reduction at e-actions accounted for decrease by only 10%. </span></span></span></p>
<p style="margin: 15px 0px; font-size: 14px;"><span style="color: #000000;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: tahoma, arial, helvetica, sans-serif;">- There are numerous examples in which contracting authorities have taken different actions in same situations,  i.e. when bidding companies have not submitted complete bids. Some contracting authorities requested them to provide the necessary additional documents, while others immediately excluded said companies from the procurement procedure. </span></span></span></p>
<p style="margin: 15px 0px; font-size: 14px;"><span style="color: #000000;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: tahoma, arial, helvetica, sans-serif;">The report is available <a href="https://www.dropbox.com/s/fflwvjdqed4h09p/l10e.pdf?dl=0" target="_blank" style="color: #4488bb; font-family: &quot;Lucida Grande&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, Arial, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;">here</a>. For more information, please contact the Center for Civil Communications by tel.: (02) 3213-513 or by e-mail: <a href="mailto:center@ccc.org.mk" style="color: #4488bb; font-family: &quot;Lucida Grande&quot;, &quot;Lucida Sans Unicode&quot;, Arial, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;">center@ccc.org.mk</a>.</span></span></span></p>