The encyclopedia · Strategy & Leadership · Operational decision · 2011–2023
Bangladesh's e-GP moved public tenders online and saved about 7% of procurement costs
Bangladesh digitized the whole public-procurement chain, cutting costs ~7% and lifting GDP by US$1.4-1.6 billion a year.
Central Procurement Technical Unit, Bangladesh · Bangladesh Ministry of Planning · World Bank
the move
Before e-GP, Bangladeshi contractors physically carried paperwork to the capital to submit tenders, and some faced political muscle men trying to stop them from bidding. The manual process invited coercion, favored insiders, and dragged procurement lead times out to about 100 days.
With World Bank support, the Central Procurement Technical Unit built e-GP: online submission, evaluation, approval, award, complaint tracking and audit-ready records. From 2% of procurement expenditure in 2017, the system processed about 80% by 2022, serving some 1,300 public organizations and 103,000 registered bidders.
The measurable results were large: about 7% savings on procurement costs versus paper-based purchasing — roughly US$1.4 billion of budget savings in 2023 — plus a GDP lift estimated at US$1.4-1.6 billion a year, and lead times cut from 100 to 53 days.
why it works
- An audit trail makes coercive and collusive deals visible and punishable.
- Online submission lowered barriers for smaller and newer bidders, widening competition.
- Standardized timelines compressed delays from invitation to contract signing.
- Citizen monitoring turned the public into an extra layer of oversight.
what transfers
Digitize the whole chain, not just the bid: when every step leaves a timestamped record, the cost of collusion rises and the cost of participation falls.
what came after
By 2022 e-GP earned roughly US$215 million in fees, approaching self-sustainability, and the government extended the system with international procurement, framework agreements, electronic contract management and geo-tagging in 2023-2024.
references
- World Bank helps Bangladesh transform public procurement into a sustainable online system
- Introducing E-Procurement in Bangladesh: The Promise of Efficiency and Openness (Policy Research Working Paper 10390)
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