The Union Cabinet has given its approval for expanding the mandate of the government’s online public procurement platform, Government e-Market (GeM), by allowing procurement by co-operatives.

“More than 8.54 lakh registered co-operatives and their 27 crore members would benefit from this initiative,” according to an official release issued by the government after the meeting on Wednesday. 

Allowing co-operative societies to register on GeM as buyers would help them in getting competitive prices through an open and, transparent process, it added.

The GeM was launched on August 9, 2016 by the Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Government of India to create an open and transparent procurement platform for government buyers.

Average savings for buyers

According to an independent assessment made by the World Bank, average savings for buyers in GeM portal is about 9.75 per cent on the median price, the Commerce and Industry Ministry had stated earlier. Cost comparison of various commodities on GeM with those of popular online platforms such as Amazon and Flipkart showed that GeM prices were 9.5 per cent lower, an analysis in the Economic Survey 2021-22 pointed out.

The Ministry of Cooperation, in consultation with the GeM SPV, will prepare the validated list of cooperatives to be onboarded on GeM for pilot as well as subsequent scale up. “This will ensure that technical capacity and logistics requirement of the GeM system are taken into account while deciding the pace of on boarding of co-operative as buyers on GeM,” the release said.

GeM will provide a dedicated onboarding process for cooperatives, provide the technical infrastructure to support additional users on existing portal, and also assist co-operatives for onboarding and transaction journeys, via available contact centers, in-field training and other support services.

To protect interests of the broader seller community on GeM and ensure timely payments, the modalities of payment systems shall be decided by GeM in consultation with the Ministry of Cooperation.