Public procurement is closely observed by countries striving to achieve the free movement of goods, services and employees, one of the basic principles of the common market in the European Union. The European Accession Agreement, the so-called Association Agreement, concluded between the Slovak Republic and Member States of the European Union (hereinafter referred to as "the EU") states that the Slovak Republic shall support the free movement of goods, services, persons and capital. On the basis of the above facts and in relation to the so-called White Paper drawn up by the European Commission and with regard to tasks arising from it, the Slovak Republic has decided to proceed by drawing up a new Act on Public Procurement.

Following adoption of Act No 263/199 Coll. of Laws, new rules have been applied in the Slovak Republic from 1 January 2000 whose aim is to attain the best value for money from procurement, this means the best quality for the lowest price, to create a fair environment for entrepreneurs, and to confer the necessary powers as well as responsibilities for the public procurement process on procuring entities.

On 14 September 1999 the National Council of the Slovak Republic adopted a new Act on Public Procurement and on Amendment of Certain Acts, which was published in the Collection of Laws of the Slovak Republic under number 263/1999 (hereinafter referred to as "the Public Procurement Act"). On the basis of this Act, a new central state administration authority was established - the Office for Public Procurement. Its task is to ensure that public and concession procurement policy is applied in a transparent and non-discriminatory manner in the Slovak Republic and in compliance with the principle of non-discrimination.

The activities carried out by the Office are ensured through budgetary measures. The Office has obtained further funds through delimitation from the Ministry of Construction and Regional Development of the Slovak Republic, from eight regional offices, and from the PHARE programme for the procurement of data processing technology.

The Office's activities have been carried out by employees delimited from the Ministry of Construction and regional Development of the Slovak Republic and eight regional Offices (42). The number of employees has gradually increased, and as of 31 December 2000 the Office had 101 employees.

The employees delimited from regional offices work at three Branch Offices in Žilina, Nitra and Košice.

After acquiring suitable new premises for the Office (the Office moved from Lamačská Road to Páričková Street), the material and technical equipment necessary to carry out the Office's tasks was procured in compliance with the Public Procurement Act.

The information system has been developed partially from own funds and partially from funds provided from the PHARE programme.

The deliveries and installation of data processing technology started in October 2000 and lasted till February 2001.

In the methodological field, the Office's main task was to prepare model forms - guidelines for drawing up preliminary notices, notices of invitation to public procurement and contract award notices. Methodological guidelines dealt with issues such as specifications of the subject of procurement, the possibility to divide the subject of procurement and criteria restricting such a division. In the second half of 2000, the methodological guidelines mostly addressed requests for an explanation of the use of negotiated procedures without prior notification.

The Office's activities in the field of public procurement education and training were carried out according to the National Training Programme Policy aimed at acquiring professional qualification in a number of stages.

Stage I "Training the trainers for public procurement" - during this stage activities such as selecting trainers were carried out, and training courses were arranged. One of the most time consuming activities was preparing suitable training materials for the trainers, a task which lasted the whole year. The objective of training the trainers for public procurement was to train external professionals from the field of public procurement, who in the following phases would train persons applying for acquiring professional qualification for public procurement. During this training of the trainers for public procurement, 76 persons obtained certificates of trainers authorised to train persons applying for acquiring professional qualification in the field of public procurement according to the Public Procurement Act, of which 19 were employees of the Office and 57 were external professionals.

The Office further arranged all preparatory activities for Stage II "Training courses for acquiring professional qualification", which are "professional training courses" according to Art. 60 of the Public Procurement Act.

Under publicity activities, the Offices published an information leaflet and information bulletin in both Slovak and English.

In the legislative and legal fields, the Office concentrated on drawing up:

• contracts concluded by the Office (37);
• suggestions to the draft Act amending the Act on Administrative Fees;
• draft Regulation of the Government of the Slovak Republic on publication of prior information notices, contract notices, contract documents and contract award notices published under No 389/2000 Coll. of Laws;
• opinions on drafts of legal regulations submitted for comments by other government sectors.

During the assessed period, the Office focused on activities relating to the activities of the Slovak Republic as a candidate country, in particular:

• participation of the Office at meetings of Working Group No 1 - Free Movement of Goods
• contribution to work on the National Programme for Adoption of the acquis communautaire;
• preparation of materials for the Report on Preparedness of the Slovak Republic for Accession to the EU;
• entering bilateral relationships with V4 countries and Austria;
• co-operation with OECD/SIGMA, EFTA, WTO and the World Bank;
• co-operation with consultants from Berlioz and CO company aimed at preparing educational and training materials in the public procurement field.

Up to the end of 2000, procuring entities published information relating to public procurement procedures in the Commercial Journal published by the Ministry of Justice of the Slovak Republic. Throughout the year, the Office acted as co-ordinator between procuring entities and the Ministry of Justice of the Slovak Republic and arranged the publishing of notices submitted by procuring entities.

From the beginning of the assessed year, a total of 7,802 notices were published in the Commercial Journal, of which 73% were notices of invitation to open procedures, 4% notices of invitation to restricted procedures, and 1% notices of negotiated procedures with prior notification. Of this total number, 559 public procurement methods were cancelled.

A priority task for the Office was to select a publisher for the Journal of Public Procurement. A special committee appointed by the Office selected Poradca podnikateľa spol. s r.o. (limited liability company) registered in Žilina from among 18 entrepreneurial entities. In November a special issue of the Journal of Public Procurement was issued containing the applicable Public Procurement Act and other information about the Office.

During 2000 the Office dealt with a number of cases arising from the new Public Procurement Act and also according to Act of the National Council of the Slovak Republic No. 263/1993 Coll. of Laws. The office received 157 submissions leading to supervision over public procurement procedures.

According to the delimitation protocols, 1,955 files were transferred from regional offices to the Office. A total of 124 submissions leading to the initiation of administrative proceedings were registered.

In 2000 the Office received 508 objections. The most common issues requiring a decision by the Office were objections concerning the exclusion of candidates or tenderers from public procurement procedures, and decision on the ranking of the evaluated tenders.

For the first time, the Office carried out a statistical survey of public procurement methods used in 2000 according to the new Act No. 263/1999 on Public Procurement and on Amendment to Certain Acts.

During the examined period 4,145 public procurements methods leading to the conclusion of contracts were initiated, of which 481 were not completed before the end of 2000. Procuring entities concluded contracts for a total of SKK 53.5 billion (* EUR 1.26 billion). The savings of funds reached 7.2%.

An evaluation of used public procurement methods shows that the non-tendering procurement method was most frequently used, i.e. the negotiated procedure without prior notification.

* Average exchange rate in 2000: 1 EUR = 42.589 SKK