WHAT IS GOVERNMENT E MARKET PLACE
Updated on : 2020-Dec-01 16:47:48 | Author :
WHAT IS GOVERNMENT E MARKET PLACE (GeM - gem.gov.in)?
Government e-Marketplace (GeM - gem.gov.in) could be a terribly daring step of the govt.
With the aim to vary the manner during which acquisition of products and services is finished by the govt.
Ministries and Departments, Public Sector Undertakings and alternative apex autonomous bodies of the Central Government.
Public acquisition portal GeM is functioning on a series of steps as well as a mechanism for timely payment to vendors and rating patrons and sellers to push its.
The Commerce Ministry launched Government e-Marketplace (GeM), an internet platform for public acquisition, in August 2016 with the target of making AN open and clear acquisition platform for the state.
They area unit functioning on many things like making certain timely payment to vendors, serving to MSMEs get assets from banks and rating of each purchaser and merchandiser to.
Currently, a purchaser needs to pay in ten days to the merchant; however, it's not being enforced properly.
Timely payment can facilitate the government in promoting competition among vendors and MSME growth.
They area unit functioning on a system which might strictly guarantee payments in an exceedingly fastened timeline to the seller if quality and alternative things area unit are okay.
GeM is additionally formulating a mechanism to rate each seller and patrons.
If a purchaser doesn't pay on time, the rating is affected and sellers would use caution in delivering merchandise and services.
Similarly, if a merchandiser doesn't deliver merchandise on time and if there are quality problems, the rating is unhealthy.
Good ratings can facilitate sellers in obtaining assets at cheap value from banks on sharing group action history.
So that they area unit functioning one of these steps.
Banks will see rating and risk history of patrons and consequently lend at low value conjointly.
Through this, we are able to establish credit linkage to MSMEs.
The government is additionally considering widening the extent of GeM by allowing government contractors and personal bulk patrons to use the platform for getting merchandise and services.
Currently, they're not allowed to acquire merchandise and services from the GeM platform managed by the Commerce and Business Ministry.
At gift, government departments, ministries, public sector units, state governments, and Central Armed Police Forces area unit allowed to holdout transactions through this portal.
The government has created it obligatory for all the departments and ministries to supply merchandise and services from its e-marketplace.
The portal provides a good vary of product from workplace letter paper to vehicles.
Vehicles, computers and furniture area unit presently the highest product classes.
Services, as well as transportation, logistics, waste management, internet casting and analytical, among others, area unit listed on the portal.
The challenge
Government organizations and agencies around the world procure a large range of products and services from the private sector so as to run their country.
Given the scale and geographic spread of public procurement in India across Central and State Ministries, Departments, and their affiliates, before GeM, India’s public procurement landscape was marred by several inefficiencies, some of that are listed below:
1. Limitations & inefficiencies in procurement system
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Geographic coverage of standardized procurement limited to localized vendor base
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Non-availability of granular data/ MIS on public procurement
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Limited range of product categories under standardized rate contracts
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Lack of price reasonability (either individually selected vendors OR prices locked for 1 year under rate contracts)
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Limited demand aggregation/ benchmarking across organizations to optimize for bulk purchases
2.Time consuming, heavily manual processes
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Admin overhead for buying organizations in terms of manpower & effort required
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Time consuming, cumbersome registration & verification processes for sellers
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Manual process inefficiencies such as offline payments processes
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Manual rate negotiations resulting in opacity and possible cartel formation
3. Complex policy landscape with potential for conflicts – Many purchase preference policies exist in India today at both Central & State level resulting in complicated decision making for buyers.
While a private buyer can choose his purchasing strategy flexibly, the public sector had limited options to respond dynamically to anti-competitive behaviour due to strict regulatory and legislative framework as well as detailed administrative procedures on multiple levels of government.
The initiative
In order to improve transparency of decision-making in the public procurement process and to reduce malpractices, Indian government, i.e. the Ministry of Commerce and Industries and the Department of Commerce, decided to set up an online marketplace for public procurement, a Government-to-Business platform (G2B). An online marketplace (or e-commerce marketplace) is a type of e-commerce site where products or services are offered by a number of sellers and all the buyers (i.e. the government agencies and departments) can select the products and services offered by any of the sellers, based on their own criteria. This enables a competitive evaluation structure and implies the govt. procures additional cost-efficiently.
The Indian government introduced the govt E-Marketplace ‘GeM’ in August 2016 as an end-to-end on-line marketplace to facilitate on-line procural of common use goods and services needed by central and authorities ministries, departments, public sector undertakings, autonomous establishments, organizations, and native bodies at the right worth, right quality and right amount in an exceedingly clear and economical manner. among but 3 years since its implementation, about 290,000 sellers & service providers have signed up to the platform. They sell more than 1,400,000 merchandise to more than 39,000 customer organizations across Central and state government Ministries, Departments, and their affiliates.
In parallel, the Indian government amended the GFR (General financial Rules) and caused a amendment in procural directives that mandated all organizations and departments under the Central Government to obtain from GeM.
GeM aims to reinforce transparency, potency and speed publically procural. It provides the tools of e-bidding, reverse e-auction and demand aggregation to assist governments achieve the most effective price for their cash and hence, use taxpayers’ cash with efficiency. GeM conjointly provides the patrons with an choice to choose only MSMEs and select a vender from amongst them. This has helped buyers in significantly increasing share of MSME purchases in their overall procural of products and services.
GeM may be a dynamic, independent and easy portal that's hospitable sellers of all sizes. It encourages MSME sellers through special filters on the portal. GeM aims to assist all the govt. officers in getting goods and services that are of common use like air conditioning and heating instrumentation, writing instruments, water, projectors, table and computer supplies and services like security, human resources, housework, among others.
Purchases up to Rs 25,000 (around 280 GBP) will be made of any of the offered suppliers on the GeM directly by any ministry or department, meeting the requisite quality, specification and delivery amount. for anything that prices beyond Rs 25,000, purchases got to be created through price comparison, bidding or reverse auction, wherever the criterion of the bottom worth among available suppliers on the GeM should be followed to confirm price efficiency.
The public impact
A transparent public procurance system not solely improves the govt functioning however additionally helps to spice up innovation within the private sector. a good and clear public procurance system in india has encouraged greater participation from companies within the bidding process still as making certain a competitive bidding method between various companies.
So far, 23 states & six union territories (out of twenty nine states and seven union territories), like Andhra Pradesh, assam and Gujarat who have signed MoUs with the central government for getting on board the GeM, and lots of dealers and small businesses across the state reveal a growing interest in changing into a neighborhood of the portal. For them, the portal provides a chance to scale up their business and increase sales. procurement for all World Bank-funded comes within the country has currently additionally been enabled on GeM.
On a state level, the government’s e-marketplace has considerably improved transparency of government purchases as a result of most common use things like computers, printers, photocopiers, paper and stationary, furthermore as other office things like article of furniture, and drinking water for instance area unit being purchased through GeM. Since its gap, this Business to Government (B2G) platform, has eliminated multiple levels of manual, consecutive verification and decision-making, resulting in dramatic reductions in lead-time in government acquisition. For suppliers, too, this has opened attractive new choices by eliminating intermediaries and guaranteeing prompt release of payment.
This is particularly remarkable for small Indian states. according to Srikanth Douripalli, regional manager for GeM in province, in its but 2 years of existence there are around 5,000 products offered for on-line purchase in province (one of the smallest Indian states) with 37,000 government organizations and Public Sector Undertakings (PSUs) registered and 250,000 sellers and service providers. The portal supported two.1 mn orders price three.5 bn GBP as of August 2018, with an average overall savings for the buyers (mainly the govt. agencies) of 25 %. The bihar government has bought various things valued at Rs 423 crore via the GeM portal and saved between Rs 70,000 to Rs 1 100000 for each vehicle purchased for the police department, as on july 2019.
The Union Government on Jan 14, 2019 launched the ‘Womaniya on Government e Marketplace (GeM)’, an initiative to enable women entrepreneurs and women self-help groups (WSHGs) to sell handicrafts, handloom, accessories, and different product on to Government departments and establishments. Nearly eightieth ladies-owned institutions in india are self-financed and more than 60 minutes of 8 mn units are closely-held and led by women entrepreneurs from socially-challenged sections. Womaniya on GeM can spur hyper-local economic opportunities for women entrepreneurs and achieve gender-inclusive economic growth.
The Ex-CEO of GeM, Radha Chauhan, states that the goal of engaging more sellers from small and medium sized enterprises as well as from isolated regions to advertise their merchandise on the platform, has been productive so far: “Since its inception in 2016, GeM has nowadays over 15 august 1945 of its sellers as small, medium and small enterprises who contribute quite forty fifth of sales by worth on the platform, making opportunities for small makers in remote hinterlands of the country to sell and to interface with the govt., directly”, she says.
Exact numbers on the quantitative savings impact of GeM but vary between sources and are so not fully conclusive.
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