Procurement reform in the ghana health sector

Abstract

In most countries procurement is undervalued compared to the attention paid to other key areas of Public Sector Reforms. Ghana represents a case in point. Under the health reforms in Ghana, the Ministry of Health and its partners (donors, financing institutions and the private sector) recognized the importance of procurement in its Medium-Term Health Sector Strategy for Ghana 1997 to 2001. With the aid of an external consultant, using a highly participatory approach in the development, training, and the implementation of new structures and procedures, good results have been achieved. Although work is ongoing and important challenges still need to be addressed, the authors argue that the new procurement structures now in place can serve as an example of a standardized support system for health reforms.----------------* Rob

Research perspectives on public procurement: Content analysis of 14 years of publications in the journal of public procurement

“…USA and UK are the most diffused unit of analysis (38% of papers), probably because active in the field from very long time; however, other countries' relevance is increasing (e.g. developing countries whose public procurement practices can inspire reforms and changes in more bureaucratic countries (e.g., Verhage et al, 2002;Jones, 2002;Achua, 2011;Basheka, 2011)). Taking into consideration the country focus is extremely important, as approaches and topics may vary significantly; for example, USA and UK have a balanced approach in addressing the different government level, while others prefer to focus at central (e.g.…”

“…Table 7 provides an overview of the category unit of analysis found in the articles included in the review. First of all, it is interesting to notice that only 61 out 207 papers are focused on specific types of purchases (29%); defense purchasing is the most addressed, especially as an example of procurement practices at the central government level (e.g., Buchanan & Klingner, 2007;San Miguel et al, 2008;Roberts, 2010); then, with a similar number of papers, there are professional services (e.g., Schiele, 2009), construction (e.g., Patil & Molenaar, 2011) and health purchasing (e.g., Verhage et al, 2002). Surprisingly, a spectrum of categories remained comparatively understudied: no article considers environment and social care purchasing, while ICT and indirect purchases (e.g., MRO), education purchasing and transport are rarely addressed (e.g., Deis et al, 2004;Sieverding, 2008;Leviäkangas, 2013).…”

“…Focusing the attention on macro-level organizations, research is particularly rich in terms of practical organizational design cases: during the years studied, different authors have tried to deepen the knowledge on this aspect by studying procurement organization with different perspectives, such as developing countries (e.g., Verhage et al, 2002), the comparison with private sector principles (e.g., Leenders et al, 2003), governance models (e.g., Snider, 2006) and organization at different government levels (e.g., Glock & Broens, 2013).…”

Theory building in public procurement

“…A series of models was developed to test each of the study’s propositions (Alkadry, 2004, p. 11). Verhage et al ’s (2002) article titled “Procurement Reform in the Ghana Health Sector” was identified as a reporter. The authors, based on a case study, describe the Ghana health reforms and the role of procurement.…”

How and why pharmaceutical reforms contribute to universal health coverage through improving equitable access to medicines: a case of Ghana

“…Over the years, essential medicines issues are captured in national policies with goals to improve access. For example, the MoH and its stakeholders recognized the importance of procurement in its Medium-Term Health Sector Strategy for Ghana 1997-2001 (38). The supply and management of medicines were rationalized through central and regional medical stores to improve medicine distribution and management at all levels of healthcare delivery (11).…”