Government e-Marketplace

Government e-Marketplace
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Highlights

Public procurement forms a very important part of government activity and reform in public procurement is one of the top priorities of the government. Government e-Marketplace (GeM - gem.gov.in) is a very bold step of the Government with the aim to transform the way in which procurement of goods and services is done by the ministries and the departments, PSUs and other apex autonomous bodies of th

Public procurement forms a very important part of government activity and reform in public procurement is one of the top priorities of the government. Government e-Marketplace (GeM - gem.gov.in) is a very bold step of the Government with the aim to transform the way in which procurement of goods and services is done by the ministries and the departments, PSUs and other apex autonomous bodies of the Central government.

GeM is a technology driven platform to facilitate procurement of goods and services by various ministries and agencies of the government. The portal was launched on 9th August 2016. At present, more than 7400 products in about 150 product categories and hiring of transport service are available on GeM portal.

Transactions for more than Rs 140 Crore have already been processed through GeM. GeM eliminates human interface in vendor registration, order placement and payment processing, to a great extent. Being an open platform, GeM offers no entry barriers to bona fide suppliers who wish to do business with the government.

At every step, SMS and e-Mail notifications are sent to buyer, his/her head of organization, paying authorities as well as sellers. Online, cashless and time bound payment on GeM is facilitated; web-services integration is being extended to payment systems of Railways, Defence, major PSUs and State governments.

Very soon, GeM will also start getting feeds from various other public procurement portals which will ensure that the same item has not been procured at a lesser rate by any other government agency, from the same or a different vendor. In the existing system, there is zero check on the antecedents of the suppliers for small value procurements (up to Rs 1 lakh) whose cumulative value is huge across the government organisations. GeM does a 100% online verification of all vendors irrespective of the value of procurement.

The transparency, efficiency and ease of use of the GeM portal has resulted in a substantial reduction in prices on GeM, in comparison to the tender, Rate Contract and direct purchase rates. The average prices on GeM are lower by at least 15-20%, and in some cases even up to 56%, according to PIB. If pursued to its logical conclusion, GeM would eventually emerge as the National Public Procurement Portal, keeping in tune with the global best practices.

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