Symposium 30th October 2009 on Donor Driven Pooled Procurement

Pooled procurement: short term gain, long term pain?

What is the role of pooling demands, how does it affect product availability and access to drugs in developing countries?
Major steps have been set towards pooled procurement. But is this always beneficial to the patients needing essential drugs? Could one see also trends that it leads to a limitation of availability or even reduction of available medication?
Taking the aspect of quality, institutional donors demand FDA and/or WHO prequalification or other product quality requirements and often specific product characteristics, thus limiting the number of eligible suppliers.
Professional procurement agencies are aware and capable to meet these requirements but at the same time it could reduce the flexibility and margins of the responsive industry partners. For local or regional actors it often creates bottlenecks.
Local producers and local practices are in most cases not in line with the international standards. A gap between product availability and standard business practices is created. Currently, outside of South Africa, there is no African manufacturer of pharmaceuticals that is WHO or FDA pre-qualified and no real preferred treatment seems feasible to include them in the international arena.
What is the impact of supplier service and priority for individual countries and organizations that procure their own supplies in an environment where professional procurement agents manage huge portfolios, making side arrangements like ceiling prices and limit the number of suppliers?
Major Asian manufacturers of drugs are protecting their interest either by moving to US and European markets or by using patent protections.

Did we move from improved quality assurance conditions to market limitation and possibly market protection and what effect does pooled procurement have?

i+solutions, operating herself in pooled procurement partnerships, decided to put forward these questions and announces a one day symposium in The Netherlands on 30th October 2009. In order to come to a joint approved way forward we anticipate to face the side effects during that day.

With various speakers from public and private organizations and a forum discussion i+solutions would like to address topics such as:

From a recipient point of view:
Lack of clarity and the unawareness of implementers in the field about the latest funding requirements. The way the government systems are set up and how time consuming procedures are. How the PSM (Procurement and Supply Management) is functioning and how more mandatory layers in the system could lead to inefficiency.

From a donor (supported by a PA) point of view:
Different donor conditions require a specialized layer between producers and users. How best to get a quality pharmaceutical product to the patients once arrived in country, within the budget limitations of the local stakeholders.

From a manufacturer point of view:
How the international generic market is evolving at the supply side, what are suppliers initiating and to what extend is local production taken into account.

From an overall point of view in the context of the global financial crisis:
Can a reduction of financial volume be expected? Where does the private sector come in and should we work towards more projects in public-private partnerships?

Invited are partners, clients and suppliers from i+solutions and stakeholders including WHO, PFSCM, UNITAID, GFATM as well as donors and private sector partners, active in health care.

Henk den Besten
Managing Director
i+Solutions