Procurement Planning and Service Delivery in Local Government: A Case study of Lira District and Municipality

Abstract

The main purpose of the study was to assess the relationship between procurement planning and effective service delivery by local government procurement system in Uganda with a case study of Lira District local government and municipal. The study was guided by three objectives: To establish whether procurement planning process contribute to effective service delivery, to examine the procurement planning practices that contributes to effective service delivery and to examine the relationship between the value of procurement planning and service delivery. Procurement planning was poorly done and executed at Lira Municipal Council (MC) and this led to a number of procurements not being executed and conducting procurements outside the procurement plan, hence hampering on service delivery in the district. The study was necessitated since procurement planning forms the basis of all procurement activities and public procurement’s main goal is to provide efficient and effective services to the citizens. The study employed both qualitative and quantitative research design. The target population comprised of 170 and 130 sample was used (with a response rate of 90.77% got) district employees. Cluster sampling technique was employed and within each cluster, random and purposive sampling techniques were used to select samples for this study. Data was collected using structured questionnaires. The quantitative data collected was analysed using SPSS. The study findings reveals that, there is positively, strong and significantly relationship between procurement planning and service delivery. Procurement planning process represented by r. value of .947**, procurement planning practice at r. value of .989** and finally value of procurement planning at r. of .971** all at 0.000 level of significance. It can also be concluded that of the three the constructs under procurement planning (procurement planning process, practices and value) the one that has more impact on improvement of service delivery is procurement planning value and will lead to improvement in service delivery by 30.9%; followed by the procurement planning process (20.9%); and finally, the procurement planning practice by 17%. Finally, a number of recommendations were suggested such as the need to do market capability analysis (market survey), effectively design a comprehensive procurement plans and create awareness to all staff on the need to prepare procurement plans.