The Tunisian e-procurement system (TUNEPS) was launched in January 2013. TUNEPS is important as public procurement represents some 15% of the Tunesian Gross Domestic Product (GDP). According to Secretary of State for Finance, Slim Besbes, the e-procurement system will give further efficiency and transparency to the public procurements with a better management of public funding in Tunisia, since “public spending necessarily goes through public procurements”.
TUNEPS in more detail
The start of this project concerns nine pilot sites in the first stage:
- the Prime Ministry,
- the Ministries of Education, Information and Communication Technologies and Equipment and
- 5 public enterprises: Tunisian Electricity and Gas Company (STEG), the Tunisian post, National Sanitation Board (ONAS), Urban Renewal and Rehabilitation Agency (ARRU), National Water Exploitation and Distribution Company (SONEDE).
In a second stage TUNEPS will be expanded to other public procurers.
This project aims to strengthen the foundations of e-administration in Tunisia and anchor the principles of good management of public procurements to guarantee transparency of transactions, equality of chances and competition in addition to compressing costs.
TUNEPS is funded by a donation worth 5.7 million dollars, granted by the Korea International Co-operation Agency (KOICA) to Tunisia as part of a co-operation project concluded since 2008. TUNEPS was co-achieved by the Korean specialised enterprise Samsung SDS and several Tunisian enterprises.
Source: Launching of e-procurement system in Tunisia
Cláudia Wada on