Professor Douglas Boateng, an internationally recognised Chartered Director, strategist, social entrepreneur, and researcher, has called for the professionalisation of procurement through law, licensing, and standards to reduce waste, grow industry, and turn public budgets into lasting national assets.
He made this known while speaking to a full house of policymakers, agency heads, board members, practitioners, and students at the National Procurement Summit in Accra.
“No one boards a plane with an unlicensed pilot or submits to surgery by an unlicensed surgeon,” Professor Boateng told delegates.
“Yet every day we entrust national budgets to people who are not licensed procurement professionals. That business as usual is costing us schools, clinics, factories, jobs and public trust.”
WHY IT MATTERS NOW
• Scale of spend: Public procurement typically drives a majority share of government expenditure and a significant slice of national income.
• Economic impact: Every contract either builds capability at home or deepens dependence abroad. Buying what can be made competitively at home exports the future one container at a time.
• Human cost: “Each poor award has a face,” he said. “A mother delayed at a clinic by a broken road. A patient turned away by an idle machine. A child set back by a missing book. Procurement is not just finance. It is a moral duty.”
Professor Boateng stressed that procurement is central to supply chain performance and therefore to currency stability, service delivery, industrialisation, AfCFTA and Agenda 2063.
“Professional procurement is the first machine on the factory floor,” he noted. “It is also one of the keys to avoiding repeat bailouts.”
THE REFORMS PROPOSED
Professor Boateng outlined a focused package to move from good intentions to predictable excellence:
1. Pass an Act of Parliament to regulate the profession
o Establish a Procurement and Supply body to license practitioners, set entry standards, enforce ethics and mandate continuing development.
o Require that senior procurement roles be filled only by licensed professionals and protect their professional judgment from improper pressure.
o Maintain a public register of licensed professionals.
2. Use procurement to enable industrialisation.
o Tie major awards to verified local content, supplier upgrading, skills development and technology transfer with milestones.
o Shift from sticker price to life cycle value to reduce waste and improve reliability in roads, power, water and health.
3. Publish a simple public scoreboard by December 2026
o Share of contracts with verified local content.
o Number of suppliers upgraded to international standards.
o Average payment time to small firms.
o Share of awards through open electronic procurement.
o On time and on budget delivery rates for major projects.
“Let the public see the needle move, and let managers feel the pride and pressure that visibility brings,” he said.
A ONE YEAR STARTER AGENDA
To build momentum, Professor Boateng urged a practical twelve month plan:
• Table and pass the professionalisation bill.
• License senior officers first, then phase licensing for all practitioners with annual training hours.
• Adopt life cycle costing for capital assets and fund maintenance up front.
• Pay small suppliers within thirty days and report performance monthly.
• Stand up supplier development pilots in priority sectors.
• Create an integrity hotline and guarantee whistleblower protection.
• Hold monthly delivery reviews chaired by the head of government or the chief executive.
“None of this needs fireworks,” he said. “It needs discipline and a choice to value results over noise.”
LESSONS FROM ABROAD
Pointing to countries that turned purchasing power into national capability, he highlighted:
• South Korea, where public orders nurtured domestic suppliers in autos, electronics and shipbuilding.
• Norway, which used oil and gas procurement to develop local supply chains and intergenerational wealth.
• Singapore, which integrated procurement with industrial policy to build world class logistics and manufacturing.
“They did not wait for miracles,” he said. “They used purchase orders as tools and contracts as classrooms. We can do the same.”
PROCUREMENT SITS AT THE HEART OF SUPPLY CHAINS
Professor Boateng reminded delegates that procurement choices determine the health of entire supply chains: quality of inputs, reliability of delivery, resilience to shocks and working capital for small firms.
“You cannot fix supply chains while ignoring the discipline of buying. Procurement is where strategy meets the real economy,” he said. “Empowered, licensed buyers reduce waste, raise reliability and support factories, farms and laboratories to grow.”
A MESSAGE TO LEADERS AND THE NEXT GENERATION
“Leaders cannot fix everything at once. Fix procurement first,” he urged. “Appoint qualified people, give them authority and protection, set a clear charter that links purchasing to service reliability and industrial goals, publish simple dashboards, replace those who will not learn and reward those who deliver.”
To students and young professionals: “Procurement is not a clerical corner. It is where analysis becomes nation building. The purchase order is a policy tool. Use it wisely and you will write development into daily life.”
QUOTABLE HIGHLIGHTS
• “Professional procurement is the first machine on the factory floor.”
• “Each poor award has a face. Procurement is not just finance. It is a moral duty.”
• “If we keep procurement unregulated, we will keep exporting raw goods and importing finished goods. If we professionalise procurement, we will build value chains at home that compete on quality and delivery.”
• “Do ordinary things with steady professionalism, and we will not need to announce industrialisation. We will live it. The inconvenient truth is that without professionalised procurement backed by strong national law, industrialisation will remain a speech rather than a reality.”
ABOUT PROFESSOR DOUGLAS BOATENG
Professor Douglas Boateng is a Chartered Director, Chartered Engineer and governance strategist. A long standing advocate for industrialisation and supply chain development, he has advised boards, governments and development partners across Africa and beyond.
