Kyrgyz Republic: Assistance in Implementing Revised Agreement on Government Procurement of the WTO in Public Procurement Legislation

Country: Kyrgyz Republic
Business sector: Other
Project number: 45816
Funding source: EBRD Shareholder Special Fund
Contract type: Consultancy Services
Notice type: Invitation for expressions of interest (CSU)
Issue date: 11 Dec 2014
Closing date: 06 Jan 2015   at  23:59   London

Assignment Description:
The World Trade Organization (the WTO) establishes international agreements to facilitate international trade and remove trade barriers; however, public contracts funded from state budgets were traditionally a privilege of domestic suppliers and inaccessible to international bidders. This approach changed in 1994 with the adoption of the WTO Agreement on Government Procurement (GPA).

During the last three years the Legal Transition Programme of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (the EBRD, the Bank) has assisted countries negotiating accession to the WTO GPA on a case-by-case basis. To date support in GPA negotiations has been provided to the governments of Ukraine, Moldova, and Georgia. New countries joining the WTO, and adoption of the revised text of the GPA in 2012, created new interest in opening negotiations in the Western Balkans, Middle East and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) region. This created demand for structured, on-going cooperation between the EBRD and the WTO GPA Secretariat, as a result of which the EBRD GPA Technical Cooperation Facility was launched.

The Kyrgyz Republic is in the process of adopting a new primary public procurement law. The Ministry of Finance of the Kyrgyz Republic has prepared a new draft law on public procurement which is now being discussed in the parliamentary committees. If this law is adopted and complies with the GPA mandatory requirements, it will open the doors to the WTO GPA negotiations. In response, a technical cooperation project has been developed under the EBRD GPA TC Facility to assist the Government of the Kyrgyz Republic in preparation of the WTO GPA negotiations and throughout the GPA negotiation process.

The EBRD now wishes to engage a consultant (the Consultant) to provide support to the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Economy of the Kyrgyz Republic in preparing and conducting their bilateral and multilateral negotiations on the WTO GPA (the Assignment), including preparing and conduct

The Consultant will provide training on the GPA requirements and the GPA negotiation procedures to relevant government officials in the Ministry of Economy of the Kyrgyz Republic and the Ministry of Finance of the Kyrgyz Republic. The Consultant will also provide policy advice and legislative drafting in order to achieve the compliance of the public procurement legislation with the revised standards of the 2012 WTO GPA.

To begin with, the Consultant will provide foundation training on the 2012 WTO GPA requirements and the GPA negotiation process to Kyrgyz stakeholders. Subsequently, the Consultant will provide support in:
(a) reviewing the public procurement legal framework against the 2012 WTO GPA standards (“gap analysis”), in order to include GPA mandatory accession requirements in the secondary legislation under development;
(b) developing a policy proposal on how to implement the 2012 WTO GPA standards, on eProcurement in particular in the national public procurement legislation;
(c) preparing the GPA negotiation strategy regarding the GPA coverage offer;
(d) developing the initial, revised and final WTO GPA offers;
(e) assisting in bilateral negotiations with GPA parties;
(f) advising during GPA ratification and implementation process.

Assignment Duration: The Assignment is expected to start in late January 2015 and has an estimated overall duration of 36 months starting from signing the contract with the Consultant. No extension is envisaged.

Cost Estimate for the Assignment: EUR 132,500; exclusive of VAT.
The Consultant must determine whether any VAT would be chargeable on the services and the basis for that determination, without taking into consideration the Bank's special status as an IFI and state this to the Bank in their response to the Invitation for Expressions of Interest. To the extent that a consultant incurs input VAT on goods and services purhcased in connection with the provision of services (e.g. VAT on airline ticket) which is not otherwise recoverable by the consultant from the local tax authority, the gross cost to the consultant of such expenses shall be treated as a reimbursable expense.

Funding Source: This Assignment is funded by the EBRD Shareholder Special Fund. Please note selection and contracting will be subject to the availability of funding.

Eligibility: There are no eligibility restrictions.

Consultant Profile:

The Consultant is expected to be a firm with experience in:
• public procurement legislative drafting and policy development;
• international trade agreement negotiations;
• policy work based on the 2011 UNCITRAL Model Law on Public Procurement;
• the WTO GPA negotiations;
• international procurement legal standards, specifically in the WTO GPA.

Successful completion of the Assignment will require the cooperation of an international public procurement expert and a local legal expert, preferably with public procurement expertise. There is no budget allocated for legal translation and interpretation, so the international expert shall be fluent in English and Russian, and the local expert shall be fluent in the local language and English.

Submission Requirements:
In order to determine the capability and experience of Consultants seeking to be selected for this Assignment, the information submitted should include the following:

1. Company profile, organisation and staffing (max. 2 pages);
2. Details of previous project experience or similar assignments undertaken in the previous two years, including information on contract value, contracting entity/client, project location/country, duration (mm/yy to mm/yy), expert months provided (if different from duration), main activities, objectives;
3. CVs of the individual international expert and local expert who could be available to work on the Assignment;
4. Completed Consultant Declaration and Contact Sheet, the template for which is available from the following web-link
http://www.ebrd.com/pages/workingwithus/procurement/notices/csu/contact_sheet.doc

The above information should not exceed 10 pages excluding CVs and Contact Sheet.

The complete expression of interest (including CVs and Contact Sheet) shall be one file (pdf or Word), not exceeding 4MB to be uploaded to eSelection. The EBRD reserves the right to reject applications of firms submitting more than one file. Only if the permissible file size is exceeded, the Consultant may split the expression of interest into further files.

Expressions of Interest shall be submitted, in English, electronically through e-Selection, to reach the Bank not later than the closing date.

Bank Contact Person:
Georgia Vasiliadis (Ms)
Principal Advisor
European Bank for Reconstruction and Development
One Exchange Square
London EC2A 2JN
Tel: + 44 20 7338 7750
e-mail: vasiliag@ebrd.com (submissions should be sent through eSelection and NOT to this email address)

Notes:

1. Selection, shortlisting and contracting will normally be made from responses to this notification. Consultants will not be asked to submit a proposal. The highest-ranked Consultant will be selected from a shortlist and be invited to negotiate the contract, subject to availability of funding.

2. The evaluation criteria are as follows:
(a) Firm’s expertise and experience in public procurement policy and international procurement legal standards, specifically in the WTO GPA, and in international trade agreement negotiations (40%);
(b) International expert’s relevant experience and skills, including English and Russian language fluency, familiarity with the revised 2014 EU Directives on Public Procurement, and experience in negotiating the WTO GPA, preferably gained in the last two years (40%);
(c) Local expert’s relevant legal (and preferably public procurement) experience and skills, including fluency in English and the local language. (20%).