The Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) and the Chinese People's Armed Police (PAP) have just adopted the government procurement system to meet the demands of the market-oriented economic reforms.
Under a decree signed by Jiang Zemin, state president and chairman of the Central Military Commission (CMC) the "general outline on deepening the reforms for the procurement of materials, engineering projects and services" worked out by the PLA General Logistics Department has been approved recently.
CMC Vice-Chairmen Zhang Wannian and Chi Haotian gave instructions for the implementation of the policy.
According to Wang Ke, a CMC member who addressed the Wednesday meeting to launch the reform, different departments and units of the armed forces will make their procurements individually through a special procurement agency.
Except for highly confidential items, any procurement for materials and equipment costing 500,000 yuan or over, for engineering projects costing two million yuan or over, or projects covering a floor space of 2,000 sq.m., has to be carried out through public tender.
Individual departments will be responsible for proposing the purchase, carrying out the procurement, making payments, and auditing the whole procedure to see if there are any irregularities.
The scheme will be piloted in specific PLA and PAP units up until 2005, when it will be adopted throughout the armed forces.
(China Daily January 10, 2002)
