Digitising manual procurement processes in government could assist in curbing corruption and bolster a culture of accountability. This is according to PhD graduate Dr Lawrence Moetapele Mojaki of the Government Pensions Administration Agency (GPAA).

Dr Mojaki is a deputy director for supply chain management at the GPAA and recently completed his PhD in Economic and Management Sciences with Business Administration at the Mahikeng Campus of the North-West University (NWU).

His PhD explored the advantages of developing a digital procurement framework based on Industry 4.0 technologies for the public sector in South Africa.

“There is a need to migrate the manual procurement processes in government to digital, which has frameworks that can assist in curbing corruption in the public coffers and to make sure that there is accountability,” says Dr Mojaki, who has already written five articles from his PhD research. Three of these have been published and two are under peer review.

He notes that while governments around the world increasingly recognise the need to embrace technology in their public procurement processes, the South African government has not yet fully adopted digitisation.

Public procurement activities still rely on manual processes, which create loopholes for human interference and fraud and corruption, ultimately resulting in waste and poor service delivery.

Dr Majoki’s study explored the linkages between the internet of things, cloud computing and sustainable public procurement. He interrogated the literature on Industry 4.0 technologies in South Africa and considered various digital technologies that government can harness to improve its procurement processes.

His findings show that Industry 4.0 technologies present significant opportunities to improve public procurement systems in South Africa, while at the same time addressing sustainability by enhancing efficiency and improving preferential procurement initiatives.

The study also presented an implementation plan for a digital procurement framework that would enable full automation and cut out human error and intervention – and therefore also eliminate opportunities for fraud and corruption.

 Dr Lawrence Moetapele Mojaki recently graduated with a PhD in Economic and Management Sciences with Business Administration from the NWU.