Thesis:

Relationship between open contracting and performance of public procurement system in Makueni county

Open contracting is globally believed to improve procurement performance. Despite open contracting being cited for savings and greater efficiency in service delivery, it is not clear what aspects of open contracting relates to the good procurement performance. There has not been established a clear relationship between factors such as ICT infrastructure, capacity, data, process visibility, public participation and procurement performance in at both national and sub-national levels. Most research efforts on open contracting focus on compliance with standards but do not the relationship of its variables with those of procurement performance. This research aimed to study the contribution of open contracting to the promotion of procurement performance in Kenya with a specific focus on Makueni County. Specifically, it examined the relationship between capacity for open contracting, open contracting data, process and public participation and procurement performance. The research was based on transaction cost economics (TCE) theory. Target population was 150 county staff, 1,000 local leaders and 20,000 members of public drawn from across the county. A stratified random sample consisted of 110 county staff, 374 members of public and 19 local leaders drawn across the wards of Makueni County. Descriptive research design with structured questionnaire was used in the current research. Data was mainly quantitative and some qualitative. Descriptive statistics with mean and standard deviations was used to analyze quantitative data together with inferential statistics based on multiple linear regression in SPSS version 27. Qualitative data analysis methods such as sorting, coding, clustering, grouping, query the data based on coding, summarizing and interpreting were used. Results indicate that open contracting variables have positive and significant relationship with procurement performance. Specifically, capacity for open contracting, open contracting data, process visibility and public participation were found to have significant and positive relationship with procurement performance. It was concluded that improving the studied open contracting variable can significantly enhance procurement performance. It was recommended that capacity for open contracting should be enhanced through training programs on critical variables of procurement performance such as data accuracy, completeness, and sufficiency. Service providers should prioritize the improvement of their operational leagility and that public participation in the procurement process should be encouraged. Future research should compare open contracting across different counties to highlight differences in relationship between independent variables and procurement performance.