Defense Ministry creates two-stage procurement system in line with NATO standards

Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov wrote about this in a column for Ukrinform.

As he noted, the General Staff sent a request to the Defense Ministry for food products or clothing for the military, for example. For its part, the Ministry of Defense established procurement rules and directly purchased what the Armed Forces needed.

"The latter was a conflict of interest that led to corruption. To solve this problem, we have built a two-tier procurement system in accordance with NATO standards, where the Defense Ministry remains a key figure in policy-making and control over all procurement," Umerov wrote.

Thus, at the first stage, the deputy defense minister in charge of this issue formulates policy, summarizes the need and controls the process.

At the second stage, the state operators (the State Logistics Operator and the Defense Procurement Agency) directly carry out procurement.

According to Umerov, all non-lethal procurement will be carried out via the ProZorro system. The control over the transparency of procurement has been established, he said.

As reported, the Defense Ministry plans to boost the volume of Ukrainian weapons purchases.