The new procurement rules have been included in an emergency decree that amends public procurement legislation by doubling the threshold on direct-award public contracts and eliminates the required participation guarantee for purchases below the EUR30,000 cap.
The decree also raises thresholds on public contracts requiring public procurement auctions. The threshold will be raised to the lei equivalent of EUR5 million for public works, from the current EUR4.8 million, and to EUR200,000 from the current EUR193,000 for services contracts.
Speaking at a Mediafax Talks conference three weeks ago, Lucian Dan Vladescu, head of Romania’s procurement authority ANRMAP, said the institution was to ask the Government to raise the threshold for direct-award public contracts. He said that, in Bulgaria, the minimum value is EUR20,000 for contracts to supply products and services, EUR60,000 for works and EUR66,000 for designs, but in Romania, the threshold at which procurement procedures become mandatory is the same as in 2006.
He argued that “signals from the market” indicate that relatively low-value contracts cost more when awarded through a procurement procedure than through a direct sale.