Open Contracting Partnership

Open contracting is critical to increasing accountability and ultimately to reducing poverty. Contracts are at the nexus of revenue generation, budget planning, resource management and delivery of public goods. It is estimated that governments around the world spend over US $9.5 trillion every single year through contracts. Yet, contracting is often unavailable for public scrutiny and suffers from mismanagement and misappropriation. Citizens, the ultimate beneficiaries of public contracts, ultimately pay the price when schools are not built, bridges are not delivered according to standards, hospitals are unable to offer necessary medicines, and the environment suffers. Ultimately, contracting that is not open undermines development for all.

The Open Contracting Partnership (OCP), a collaborative effort among government and nongovernment actors and since its original foundation just two years ago, the OCP has made significant progress in positioning and advancing its goals of enhancing contracting disclosure and participation around the world. The OCP will work to make open contracting a common practice through its three program areas:
1) Promoting global norms and standards;
2) Supporting country-level application of open contracting; and
3) Supporting a community of practice for learning.

The OCP's current steering group includes these organizations: the Construction Sector Transparency Initiative (CoST), Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, Integrity Action, the governments of Colombia and the Philippines, Oxfam America, Transparency International and the World Bank Institute. The World Bank Institute (WBI) has served as the interim OCP Secretariat.
This is a critical moment for open contracting, as the OCP transitions into a new stage with its own organizational structures and funding. The OCP will build a small and full-time OCP Secretariat and an Advisory Board of Directors. It will also have group of Implementing Partners that the OCP will work with to advance open contracting. The Tides Foundation is the fiscal
sponsor of the OCP.

For more information on Open Contracting visit www.open-contracting.com