The Procurement Function in the Public Sector

Supply and demand meet in the market with the aim of acquiring or selling goods and services. In modern times, the interaction between buyers and suppliers is shifting from the geographical environment to the internet, and the use of electronic business is shaping a global market, which increases economic efficiency and transparency of the competitive market. In carrying out their activities, we spend budgetary funds, therefore in procurement we must follow the public procurement procedure, in which we select the most favourable bidder either on the basis of price or on the basis of the most economically advantageous tender.

Problem

Supply and demand meet in the market with the aim of acquiring or selling goods and services. In modern times, the interaction between buyers and suppliers is shifting from the geographical environment to the internet, and the use of electronic business is shaping a global market, which increases economic efficiency and transparency of the competitive market. Competition is not only characteristic of a market-oriented economy, but is also present in the public sector.

The task of the procurement function in any company or organisation is to ensure the supply of the company with necessary raw materials, materials, energy, services, machinery, etc. All of this must be of appropriate quality, in the right place at the right time and at a reasonable price. The State Attorney's Office belongs to the public sector, in which the procurement of goods and services is regulated through public procurement, that is, on the basis of contracts concluded between the State Attorney's Office as the contracting authority and selected suppliers.

At the State Attorney's Office, the procurement of goods and services is limited by public procurement regulations.

Solution and Method

In carrying out their activities, we spend budgetary funds, therefore in procurement we must follow the public procurement procedure, in which we select the most favourable bidder either on the basis of price or on the basis of the most economically advantageous tender. As a contracting authority, we must precisely comply with all public procurement regulations. In the Republic of Slovenia, such a public procurement procedure was adopted in 1997 with the adoption of the Public Procurement Act.

This increased the transparency of contracting authorities' operations and their economical use of public funds and prevented inequalities between bidders, whilst also increasing their competitiveness. With the emergence of public procurement, various bidders have been enabled to enter the market where they can compete for clients. State institutions as the demand side procure goods and services that they need for their operations.

With the diploma thesis, she wanted to demonstrate what function procurement has in the public sector. Above all, she investigated whether public procurement achieves sufficient quality of goods and services and how and in what way more potential bidders could be attracted and thus perhaps increase the quality of goods and services. In the first part, she used the descriptive method, where she used professional literature to describe theory, concepts and facts, and the classification method, with which she defined concepts.

Results

In the second part, she used an analytical approach, where she used the method of analysis and questioning of employees, from whom she obtained data with which, in addition to verifying how theory works in practice, she also carried out an analysis of the situation and user satisfaction, and on this basis produced recommendations for quality preparation of tenders.