"Kyrgyzstan can become a leader among the countries of Central Asia that introduce the method of «sustainable procurement," Elena Shadrina, an expert in this field in the CIS and Europe, said at the international conference «Effective Management of Public Procurement-2017.»

According to her, there are three trends in procurement in the world — electronic, the method of sustainable procurement and the development of innovations through public procurement.

«The method of sustainable procurement is successfully implemented in Moldova, Ukraine, Belarus, China and Japan. There is no mass phenomenon in Russia, but within the framework of the state order with the Moscow government, tools for its implementation are being developed. The most advanced countries in this direction are Scotland, Great Britain, a number of not the most developed countries of South America. But we noticed that  there is no country from Central Asia among them. Kyrgyzstan can become a leader in the region," the procurement expert said.

Elena Shadrina stressed that Kyrgyzstan has everything necessary for the implementation of this method — technologies, mass donor support, legislation of the country, which doesn’t prohibit the introduction of additional environmental and social criteria in tender documents that don’t affect the cost of procurement. What is needed is a desire and political will, without the latter, it is very difficult to introduce something at the state level.

«The state is the largest buyer on the market, and demand breeds supply. And if in addition to the price, quality the environmental component is requested, then the market will provide it. We need to understand that public procurement is the mechanism through which the state realizes its strategy," Elena Shadrina summed up.