On 30 June 2010, the newly adopted Law on Public Procurement (the "Law") was officially proclaimed and shall come into force from 30 July 2010.

The Law introduces new public procurement rules in Ukraine most of which are aimed at making public procurement procedures non-discriminative and more transparent.

The thresholds for applying the public procurement mechanism have been kept at the previously applicable level of UAH 100,000.00 for purchasing the goods and services and UAH 300,000.00 for ordering the works.

Although the Ministry of Economics of Ukraine (the "Ministry of Economics") continues to have the main regulatory and supervisory authority in the field of the public procurement, some of its functions have been transferred to certain other state authorities.

The main changes introduced by the Law include the following:

  • non-residents of Ukraine will be able to participate in the public procurement procedures on a parity basis with the Ukrainian residents;
  • the Anti-Monopoly Committee of Ukraine (the "AMC") will have the power to review disputes arising out of the public procurement procedures (previously the tender participant's appeals would have been addressed to the Ministry of Economics or directly to the tender organiser (i.e. the customer));
  • the period for consideration of an appeal has been extended from 20 to 30 business days;
  • tougher qualification requirements of the bid participants or participants of the preliminary qualification have been introduced. For instance, under the new rules, the tender participant must, among other documents, submit the relevant statement from the bank confirming the details of any indebtedness it may have under its credit commitments;
  • such public procurement mechanisms as "reduction" and "bids with limited participation" have been removed. The way in which other public procurement procedures, such as open bids, two-step bids, procurement from the sole participant, etc., have also been modified to make these procedures more transparent;
  • the administrative fines imposed for infringements in the field of public procurement have been increased to a maximum of UAH 17 000.

Law: Law of Ukraine on Public Procurement No. 2289-VI dated 1 June 2010.

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The original publication date for this article was 13/07/2010.