Medium Business Community "Need to Expand Designation of Competitive Products Among Small Business Owners"

The 2nd Public Procurement System Activation Committee Meeting Held This Year
Discussion on Supplementary Measures Related to Public Procurement

The small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) sector has raised its voice, emphasizing the need to expand the designation of ‘Competitive Products Among Small and Medium Enterprises.’

The Korea Federation of SMEs announced on the 11th that it held the ‘2024 2nd Public Procurement System Activation Committee’ at the Korea Federation of SMEs board meeting room in Yeongdeungpo, Seoul.

Launched in June last year, this committee conducts discussions on identifying current issues and directions for system improvements to revitalize SME participation in the procurement market. Lee Soon-jong, chairman of the Korea Furniture Industry Cooperative Federation, serves as the committee chair.

At the meeting, discussions were held on major system improvements related to public procurement this year, as well as on supplementary matters. In particular, following the Ministry of SMEs and Startups’ announcement on the 6th regarding the designation of competitive products among SMEs and direct purchase target items for construction materials, intensive discussions took place on the need for improvements in the application and designation procedures for target items pursued this year and the competitive system among SMEs.

The competitive system among SMEs is a system where only SMEs can participate in bidding for products designated every three years by the Minister of SMEs and Startups. As the designation validity of the target products expires this year, the Ministry is reviewing the designation of target items.

The SME sector applied for 619 products, but due to opposition from large corporations and public institutions, only 610 products were preliminarily designated. In response, committee members strongly voiced the need to expand product designation in line with the system’s purpose of supporting and fostering small manufacturing enterprises to establish a domestic manufacturing base.

The committee chair said, “The public procurement market is not simply a place where the government purchases goods, but it has the unique characteristic of realizing SME support policies. The government must actively improve the system to revitalize SME participation in the public procurement market, and especially to activate the competitive system among SMEs, which serves as a catalyst for entering the procurement market, it must actively designate target items.”