New Zealand government agencies are making progress in embedding the country’s latest procurement reforms, with separate self-reported capability data pointing to stronger procurement practices and greater collaboration across the public sector.
An implementation update from New Zealand Government Procurement shows 86 percent of openly advertised tenders have recently sought economic benefits for New Zealand, indicating growing compliance with the fifth edition of the Government Procurement Rules.
The latest rules took effect on 1 December 2025, introducing stronger expectations around economic benefits to New Zealand, transparency, supplier panels and whole-of-life contract management.
New Zealand Government Procurement General Manager Michael Alp said the data shows compliance is increasing as agencies adjust to the new Rule 8 requirements.
“We appreciate the effort agencies are making to adapt and change to the new requirements,” he said.
“We have tried to reduce the reporting burdens on agencies by adding new fields in GETS that gather accurate and up-to-date information about economic benefits.”
For procurements above specified value thresholds, Rule 8 requires agencies to seek economic benefits to New Zealand and assign them a minimum 10 percent evaluation weighting.
These benefits could include increasing workforce participation, providing training or apprenticeships, supporting New Zealand and regional businesses, strengthening domestic supply chains and developing local industry capability.
Elsewhere, most mandated agencies have submitted annual reports on the policy encouraging the use of woollen fibres, where practical and appropriate, in government-owned construction and refurbishment projects.
More agencies are also publishing contract award notices on the Government Electronic Tenders Service (GETS) within 30 business days of all parties signing the contract.
This is intended to strengthen accountability for public expenditure while building a more complete system-wide dataset to inform future procurement decisions.
Attention is now turning to secondary procurement through agency-managed supplier panels.
Under Rule 22, relevant agencies must report secondary procurement spend by 1 October 2026, either by publishing GETS contract award notices for secondary procurements worth $100,000 or more or through annual panel-spend reporting.
The requirement covers agencies’ internal panels and closed syndicated contracts, closing what the government describes as “a significant gap in the transparency of secondary procurement spend through agency-led panels”.
The implementation update coincides with the release of the 2025 Procurement Capability Index results, which reveal stronger policy implementation, contract visibility, performance monitoring and collaboration across the public sector.
The results are based on responses from 96 agencies, including 88 mandated and eight non-mandated agencies. This represents a 77 percent participation rate among the 114 mandated agencies required to complete the survey, although not every agency answered every question.
Among respondents, 98.9 percent said procurement policies were understood and implemented to a positive extent, while more than 84 percent recorded core contract details.
Collaboration between procurement teams and the wider organisation increased from 85.7 percent in 2024 to 93.8 percent in 2025, while the proportion of agencies identifying opportunities to improve procurement skills and competency rose from 73.4 percent to 83.4 percent.
However, the full report indicates procurement is not yet consistently recognised as a strategic function, with just 35.4 percent of agencies having a procurement strategy or strategic plan in place, although this represented an improvement from 25.5 percent in 2024.
Operational practices were also stronger, with the proportion of agencies using market research to inform procurement planning increasing from 75.6 percent to 83.4 percent.
Elsewhere, 92.7 percent had defined supplier selection methodologies and criteria and 94.8 percent provided debriefs to unsuccessful bidders.
The picture became more uneven further along the procurement lifecycle.
Despite improved visibility of critical contracts and suppliers, only 27.1 percent of agencies had a formal supplier relationship process and 62.5 percent had a structured approach to procurement-related risks.
Performance monitoring also remained inconsistent, with 77.3 percent recording whether suppliers delivered on time and 88 percent tracking whether goods and services were delivered within budget.
Workforce development remained another area for improvement, with only 40.1 percent of agencies offering procurement career pathways, although this had risen from 33.6 percent in 2024.
Reflecting on agencies’ overall implementation of the new Rules, Alp said further improvement was still needed.
“Overall, we’re really pleased and appreciative of agencies’ efforts. There are pockets where we can do better and we’d like to see improvement in the next few months, for example, more agencies need to make their procurement policies publicly available,” he said.
The 2026 Procurement Capability Index is now open, with future results expected to show whether stronger requirements under the Rules translate into more strategic planning, mature supplier management and demonstrable public value.
