The Open Contracting Data Standard is a standards development initiative issued by the
Omidyar Network
Omidyar Network is a self-styled "philanthropic investment firm," composed of a foundation and an impact investment firm. Established in 2004 by eBay founder Pierre Omidyar and his wife Pam, Omidyar Network has committed over $1.5billion to no ...
and the
World Bank
The World Bank is an international financial institution that provides loans and grants to the governments of low- and middle-income countries for the purpose of pursuing capital projects. The World Bank is the collective name for the Interna ...
which commenced in November 2014. It sets out the key documents and data which should be published at each stage of the process of letting a contract for the
procurement
Procurement is the method of discovering and agreeing to terms and purchasing goods, services, or other works from an external source, often with the use of a tendering or competitive bidding process. When a government agency buys goods or serv ...
of goods and services for the
public sector
The public sector, also called the state sector, is the part of the economy composed of both public services and public enterprises. Public sectors include the public goods and governmental services such as the military, law enforcement, infra ...
. Adoption of the standard requires publishers to release data under an open license, because "publishing data under an open license is an important part of open contracting. Without this, restrictions on re-use can prevent many of the important use cases for open contracting information being realized." Publishers are encouraged to use a scale of publishing complexity, from basic which features just tender notices, to advanced and extended data, which features contract award notices, contract details and persistent URIs.
The Open Contracting Partnership, a not for profit organisation promoting openness in contracting, argues that the use of the standard will reduce costs, create more competitive contracting, and prevent fraud and
corruption
Corruption is a form of dishonesty or a criminal offense which is undertaken by a person or an organization which is entrusted in a position of authority, in order to acquire illicit benefits or abuse power for one's personal gain. Corruption m ...
.
Origins
An early version 1.0 was released in July 2015 and version 1.1 was being developed in Q 3 and 4 2015. OCDS was designed with a focus on public procurement of goods, works and services, but it can be extended for use in other contexts. Extensions for
Public Private Partnership
In public relations and communication science, publics are groups of individual people, and the public (a.k.a. the general public) is the totality of such groupings. This is a different concept to the sociological concept of the ''Öffentlichkei ...
s (PPP) and
Extractives concessions are under development.
Implementation
Pilot implementations are underway in the following countries:
*
Canada
*
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and Nor ...
- see
UK Open Government National Action Plan 2016-18 The UK Government initially committed to using the standard for contracts administered by the
Crown Commercial Service
The Crown Commercial Service (CCS) is an executive agency and trading fund of the Cabinet Office of the UK Government. The CCS is responsible for managing the procurement of common goods and services, increasing savings for the taxpayer by cent ...
and for
High Speed Rail 2.
*
Mexico
Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...
*
Romania
Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central, Eastern, and Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Moldova to the east, and ...
*
Moldova
Moldova ( , ; ), officially the Republic of Moldova ( ro, Republica Moldova), is a Landlocked country, landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by Romania to the west and Ukraine to the north, east, and south. The List of states ...
*
Ukraine - public e-procurement system
Prozorro
Colombia,
Costa Rica and
Paraguay
Paraguay (; ), officially the Republic of Paraguay ( es, República del Paraguay, links=no; gn, Tavakuairetã Paraguái, links=si), is a landlocked country in South America. It is bordered by Argentina to the south and southwest, Brazil to ...
have also expressed interest in adopting the standard.
Private sector companies using the standard:
OpenOpps.com
OCDS Analytics
See also
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EbXML
Electronic Business using eXtensible Markup Language, commonly known as e-business XML, or ebXML (pronounced ee-bee-ex-em-el, 'bi,eks,em'el as it is typically referred to, is a family of XML based standards sponsored by OASIS and UN/CEFACT whose ...
*
Universal Business Language
Universal Business Language (UBL) is an open library of standard electronic XML business documents for procurement and transportation such as purchase orders, invoices, transport logistics and waybills. UBL was developed by an OASIS Technical Co ...
External links
Project website
http://standard.open-contracting.org
References
{{reflist
Anti-corruption measures
Contract law
World Bank
Open data
Markup languages