Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions – A strategy for e-procurement

This Communication presents the strategic importance of electronic procurement (e-procurement) and sets out the main actions through which the Commission intends to support the transition towards full e-procurement in the EU.

E-procurement can significantly simplify the way procurement is conducted, reduce waste and deliver better procurement outcomes (lower price, better quality) by stimulating greater competition across the Single Market. It can also contribute to addressing two of the main challenges the European economy is facing today: the need to maximise the efficiency of public expenditure in a context of fiscal constraints and the need to find new sources of economic growth.

Contracting authorities and entities that have already made the transition to e-procurement commonly report savings between 5 and 20%; experience also shows that investment costs can be rapidly recouped. Given the size of the total procurement market in the EU, each 5% saved could return around €100 billion to the public purse. E-procurement also delivers significant environmental benefits by reducing paper consumption and transport, as well as the need for costly archiving space with its attendant energy consumption.

The economic and environmental benefits of e-procurement thus go hand-in-hand – contributing to the sustainable growth objective of the EU 2020 Strategy. Moreover, the Digital Agenda for Europe and the eGovernment Action Plan 2011–2015 highlight the importance of connecting e-procurement capacities across the Single Market.

Despite these undisputable benefits, the EU is lagging behind both its own targets and internationally. E-procurement is still used in only 5-10% of procurement procedures carried out across the EU despite ambitious political targets. By comparison, a full online procurement market place has already been achieved in Korea, which generated savings of US$4.5 billion (about 8% of total annual procurement expenditure) annually by 2007; in Brazil 80% of public procurement is carried out electronically. The EU should act now to reap the benefits offered by e-procurement and to avoid losing competitiveness.

The Commission has put forward an ambitious but realistic proposal to modernise the EU's public procurement legal framework as foreseen in the 2011 Single Market Act. One objective of these proposals is to achieve a full transition to e-procurement in the EU by mid-2016.

The ultimate goal is "straight through e-procurement" with all phases of the procedure from notification (e-notification) to payment (e-payment) being conducted electronically. This will maximise the efficiency gains of e-procurement for the public sector and allow European companies – especially SMEs – to exploit the full benefits of the Digital Single Market.

EUR-Lex: COM(2012)179: Follow the progress of this document through the decision-making procedure http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/HIS/?uri=COM:2012:179:FIN

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