“Sole sourcing” is the procuring of supplies without any bidding process to ensure that the most competitive prices are secured. In the less than one year it has been in office, the APNU/AFC government has repeatedly “sole sourced” pharmaceuticals – the sin it had falsely criticised the previous regime of practicing. Previously in our health sector, medicines and medical supplies were procured through two mechanisms: open bidding and bidding by pre-qualified suppliers. The latter was recommended by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and World Bank for comprehensive country purchases so as to address the complexities and scale of the pharmaceutical supply chain.
In 2010, following the recommendations of the Auditor General, the list of pre-qualified suppliers modelled after a WHO model was compiled. The prequalified suppliers would still have to bid on governmental contracts, but the prior screening served as a due diligence for reliability in the supply of pharmaceuticals that literally determined “life and death” for citizens.
A “Pre-qualification Questionnaire” by the National Procurement Administration and Tender Board (NPATB) spelled out the criteria necessary for compliance, even as it noted that the traditional international suppliers PAHO/WHO, the UNICEF, UNFPA, UNDP and IDA were automatically qualified. Suppliers also had to be legally registered in Guyana and the Caribbean; be “principally” involved in the distribution of drugs; and be in a position to supply at least 75 per cent of the number of line items on each list. The questionnaire also requested business, manufacturing, quality and product information.
In 2014, the application for pre-qualification explicitly spelt out the point system utilised in the 2011-13 criteria. There were 200 maximum points for allocation to bidders according to how they scored on a number of questions in the categories of General Information, Financial Capacity, Infrastructure, Previous Experience, Established Linkages, Manufacturer/Distributor Information, Quality Information and Product Information.
In the interest of the integrity of the process, three unnamed experts were selected by the NPTAB to select local pre-qualified suppliers, based on their ability to satisfy the publicly stated criteria.
According to the new evaluation criteria, bidders were awarded points according to how they scored on a number of questions in the above mentioned categories.
Entities seeking to pre-qualify to bid had to score 80 per cent of the 200 points. Preference was given to local pharmaceutical manufacturers and companies that have appropriate warehousing facilities. It said, too, that products manufactured in Guyana and certified by the Government Analyst Food and Drug Department automatically qualified and were eligible for a 10 per cent price advantage compared with imported items.
Under “General Information”, the evaluators were asked whether they are a legally-registered company in Guyana and would have been awarded a maximum score of five points for this. Under “Financial Capacity”, an applicant would be evaluated for its financial capacity to deliver on the bids it was awarded.
Five points are awarded if the company has over 50 full-time employees with an average time on the job of three years. Under “Infrastructure”, 10 points are given if the applicant has a warehouse facility of 30,000 square foot in Georgetown or its environs, with suitable equipment, staff, IT, security, certification, and sanitation. An additional five points were awarded if the facility has three separate temperature control zones for the storage of temperature-sensitive pharmaceuticals. Having a separate area for the storage of controlled substances, that is, narcotics, will attract a score of 10 points.
After promising to establish “new criteria” for open bidding since last December, nothing was done apart from abandoning the WHO-approved pre-qualification process.
The open bidding to be conducted today will be a free for all in which the citizenry will eventually suffer because there is no mechanism to winnow out the “fly by nighters”.
In the rush to introduce “competition” the baby was thrown out with the bathwater.
