Kyiv, May 23, 2017 – Public procurement and anti-corruption specialists from across Europe and Central Asia, and Canada, as well as representatives from international organizations, gathered today in Kyiv to attend the opening of the 13th Procurement, Integrity, Management and Openness (PRIMO) Forum.
The theme of this year’s Forum is “Government, Business, Civil Society: Fighting Corruption Together”. Over the next three days, more than 100 experts from 19 countries will discuss and share insights and best-practices in improving public procurement and good governance – with a special emphasis on fighting fraud and corruption.
The 13th PRIMO Forum is hosted by the Government of Ukraine. The World Bank works with the Government of Ukraine on different fronts to support its efforts to increase transparency and accountability.
“Combating corruption is critical for governments to effectively manage their public resources and to deliver quality services to citizens,” said Satu Kahkonen, World Bank Country Director for Ukraine, Belarus and Moldova, during her welcome remarks at the Forum. “The World Bank is committed to promoting greater transparency and accountability in public services. In Ukraine, for example, we support the utilization of the national e-procurement system for World Bank-financed projects to increase transparency. We also work with civil society organizations to help build their capacity to monitor public procurement processes and outcomes.”
Now in its thirteenth year, the PRIMO Forum is a sign of commitment of the 19 participating countries to maintain the networking and learning platform for public procurement professionals. Forum participants will seek active involvement and support from international and bilateral donors to help foster regional and cross-regional cooperation, and to further improve service delivery.
At the conclusion of the PRIMO Forum, each country will present its achievements in procurement reform over the last year and state its planned actions for the coming year, which will be monitored throughout the year. Learning from their peers, country teams will formulate and share an action plan to be monitored by governments, international financial institutions, and other procurement experts.
The PRIMO Forum is co-sponsored by the World Bank, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the Islamic Development Bank (IsDB), in cooperation with the Asian Development Bank (ADB), the European Investment Bank (EIB), Support for Improvement in Governance and Management (SIGMA), the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), and Transparency International Ukraine.
