European Union National Armaments Directors (NADs) yesterday endorsed a strategy to promote and enhance effective European armaments Co-operation in support of the ESDP. The Strategy has three aims: firstly, it will help to generate, promote and facilitate co-operation through a dedicated programme preparation phase. This phase is crucial, as early decisions are needed in order to reduce overall programme costs, to realise shortest possible timescales and have maximum performance. The second aim is related to the European Defence Industrial and Technological Base. A solid EDTIB is a prerequisite for effective European armaments co-operation. This includes greater transparency and mutual understanding between governments and industries. And a third strategic aim builds on the previous work of the Agency in improving the effectiveness and efficiency of the armaments co-operation more generally.
"The Agency has worked together with its shareholders in preparing an Armaments Strategy that provides a solid foundation for improving the way we conduct armaments cooperation in Europe. Applying the ‘Guide to the Conduct of a Programme Preparation Phase’ is a major step in translating the many facets of the Strategy into tangible action," said Eero Lavonen, who chaired the meeting.
An intrinsic part of the Strategy is the Europe Defence Test and Evaluation Base (DTEB). The Steering Board approved a Conceptual Guide for DTEB to target priority areas, coordinate investments, encourage reciprocal use of facilities and create a network of Test and Evaluation capabilities, with the aim of having a consolidated and coherent European DTEB by 2030.
The National Armaments Directors further underlined that Small and Medium-sized Enterprises are vital for an innovative and competitive European Defence Technological and Industrial Base. The EDA Steering Board therefore agreed on developing a number of measures aimed at supporting increased involvement of SMEs and non-traditional suppliers in the EDTIB. Contracting policies that will enhance SMEs opportunities to win contracts will be further analysed, and an experts’ working group will develop Common Guidelines for simplification and harmonisation of tendering and contracting processes related to lower value contracts. In addition the Agency will develop an armaments cooperation driven IT platform to enable industry to propose solutions to pMS priorities.
One key enabler is the Code of Best Practice in the Supply Chain which will be promoted more vigorously by Governments. They will also decide on a new publication threshold for the EBB in support of SMEs at their next meeting in the spring 2009.
”I think it is of great value that the NADs fully recognise the importance of SMEs for a competitive EDTIB. It is necessary to create conditions allowing SMEs and non-traditional suppliers to fully exploit market possibilities. EDA, supported by industry experts, has identified the right kind of measures.” said Chief Executive Alexander Weis.
The EDA Steering Board also reviewed today the report in the implementation of the Code of Conduct Regime on Defence Procurement which, together with its IT tool the Electronic Bulletin Board (EBB) came into effect on 1 July 2006. The assessment of the overall implementation of the Regime is positive and, in general, subscribing Member States (sMS) have adapted their procurement practices to the CoC’s provisions.
The volume of Government contract opportunities posted on the EBB has steadily grown. By 1 September 2008, 18 of the 26 sMS had published more than 340 contract opportunities.
As of the same date, 127 out of the 340 Contract Notices published by the sMS for competition had already been awarded for a total value of €2.3bn (excl. VAT), 28 being cross-border awarded contracts. There is still limited cross-border bidding by industry – only in one-third of the opportunities which is a main explanation to the relatively low number of cross-border awards. Nevertheless, in 70% of the cases when there are cross-border bidders, the contract is cross-border awarded.
EDA has been also informed by 1 September 2008 of 222 government contracts falling under the exceptions to the CoC for a total value of €2.5bn (excl. VAT), mostly for “supplementary goods and services” and “follow-on work”, which seems to be a reasonable and relatively restrictive use of the follow-on exceptions.
The Code of Best Practice in the Supply Chain (CoBPSC) and its EBB associated part (Industry-to-Industry contract opportunities) is still experiencing a slow growth in terms of publications, although it enjoys support by industry as a beneficial tool. The Agency continues its activities to increase awareness on the EBB2, including through the recently launched Call Centre which has already contacted about 2,000 defence-related companies.
The Steering Board reviewed ongoing EDA work on improving the availability of helicopters for ESDP operations. The NATO Assistant Secretary General for Defence Investment, Peter Flory, briefed the Steering Board on NATO’s ongoing activities on helicopters.