The Ministry of Industry, Investment and Commerce (MIIC), through the Jamaica Business Development Corporation (JBDC), successfully concluded a four-part island wide Public Procurement Readiness Project Workshop series, aimed at building the capacity of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) to successfully bid for public sector contracts.
The workshops facilitated by the Office of Public Procurement Policy (OPPP) within the Ministry of Finance and the Public Service (MoFPS) saw, in total, a turnout of 130 MSMEs.
The first workshop held in Kingston on March 27-28, 2023, had 43 MSMEs in attendance; the second in Mandeville, Manchester on May 28-29, 2024, with 20; the third workshop in St James on June 11-12, 2024, with 19; and the final workshop, held at the JBDC Incubator and Resource Centre in Kingston on July 11-12, 2024, had 48 MSMEs joining the initiative.
“As Jamaica’s Business Ministry, the Ministry for MSMEs, it was important for us [MIIC] to drive this initiative and empower our MSMEs with the knowledge and tools needed to thrive in a competitive marketplace,” stated Karen Hylton, Small Business Financing Specialist at MIIC, in her opening statement at the final workshop.
“This workshop not only serves to train MSMEs in how to prepare bid documents but also to break down the Set-Aside Orders and the fundamentals of the public procurement process – what the intricacies are, what it means to MSMEs, the benefits and opportunities available and what the requirements would be to meet the eligibility criteria.”
Chantol Dormer, Manager, Project Management and Research at JBDC echoed similar sentiments by adding that “Our goal was to ensure that not only MSMEs in our clientele but also MSMEs in the general populous have the opportunity to access the information that this training provides.”
“We want MSMEs to walk away with a feeling of empowerment that the government contract market is accessible to them and that it can be an important component of their business growth,” highlighted Andrei Bennett, Chief Public Procurement Policy Officer at OPPP. “The second thing is that we want them to have a clear understanding of what it takes to participate in the government contract space; understanding government requirements, how to respond to the tender calls that are put out, and how to make the most attractive bids possible, and thirdly to tell somebody else.”
MSMEs face significant challenges in public procurement. Often lacking the resources and technical expertise needed to participate in public bids, many MSMEs opt out of the process altogether. Public entities purchase a diverse range of goods and services from the private sector, representing a substantial portion of the public sector budget each year. As a result of these limitations, many local suppliers miss opportunities to compete for tenders.
This workshop series is part of a broader initiative by the MIIC to increase local MSMEs’ participation in public procurement, thereby promoting national growth and development. The workshop series also afforded MSMEs the opportunity to register on site for the Government of Jamaica Electronic Procurement Portal (GOJEP), a Tender Management System. Of the 130 MSMEs trained, 85 were registered on the GOJEP platform during the sessions. There were only 25 MSMEs previously registered.
