Public Procurement Service "34.5 Trillion Won Rapid Execution in First Half of This Year... Largest Scale Ever"

The Public Procurement Service (PPS) will execute procurement contracts worth 34.5 trillion KRW in the first half of this year. This is the largest scale of rapid execution in the first half ever.

On the 15th, the PPS held a ‘Rapid Execution Support Inspection Meeting for Procurement Projects’ at the Seoul Regional Procurement Service with related ministries including the Ministry of Economy and Finance and the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, local governments, and public institutions, and announced the rapid execution plan for procurement projects and Lunar New Year livelihood measures in the procurement sector.

The meeting was organized to encourage cooperation from the public sector to achieve the rapid execution goals of procurement projects in the first half of this year, and to identify and improve difficulties experienced by demand agencies in procurement contract procedures and systems.

At the meeting, the PPS announced that it will provide incentives by reducing procurement fees to the legally allowed maximum of 20% for procurement requesting agencies in the first half (20% reduction from January to April, 10% reduction from May to June), and will announce procurement plans for goods, services, and construction sectors within this month so that procurement companies can prepare production schedules such as raw material purchases in line with rapid execution.

Additionally, the PPS will shorten the mandatory review periods for large-scale construction projects: the total project cost review period will be reduced from 15 days to 10 days, the prior review period for construction costs from 10 days to 7 days, and the design adequacy review from 40 days to 30 days. In the technical bidding sector, where bid failures are frequent, the PPS plans to minimize bid failures by promoting single bidders and negotiated contracts, thereby preventing delays in national projects.

To shorten the design adequacy review period, the PPS will exempt small-scale projects (under 20 billion KRW) and defense projects from the design adequacy review, and will include the Ministry of Science and ICT and the National Tax Service in the demand agency consultative body (previously including the Korea Post, National Police Agency, and Ministry of National Defense) to enhance the expertise and efficiency of the pre-construction contract process.

The rapid execution plan also includes shortening the bidding announcement period by applying special temporary contract measures and expanding advance payments from 70% to 100% of the contract amount. In particular, the PPS explained that the payment period for advance payments and subcontract payments will be reduced from 14-15 days to within 5 days to allow rapid execution results to be felt on site.

As Lunar New Year livelihood measures in the procurement sector, the PPS will ensure early payment of contract amounts before the holiday through advance payments and network loans, and will intensively manage subcontract payments at construction sites under PPS management to prevent payment delays.

Lim Gi-geun, Administrator of the PPS, said, “In the first half of this year, the PPS and demand agencies will work as one team to achieve rapid execution at an unprecedented scale and speed,” and added, “To this end, the PPS plans to establish a close cooperative system with related ministries and regularly inspect and manage the execution status.”