ABSTRACT
Trade negotiations involving international public procurement rules are on the rise, stimulating a growing interest in having a clear picture of the economic stakes involved, including the current level of international openness. Although public procurement patterns (e.g. size of procurement markets, composition of procurement spending and level of government procurement) can be derived from traditional national accounts statistics, these figures fall short of capturing the international dimension of public procurement. Clear evidence of the impediments to international procurement in the US market can also be derived from the data provided by the Global Trade Alerts (GTA)3 project that tracks newly introduced protectionist measures around the world, including in the field of public procurement. The global pandemic has put all national health systems under tremendous pressure, proving that no country can tackle the pandemic alone, notably in terms of procuring essential protective materials. Therefore, public procurement openness is more important than ever.
