Electronic Government Procurement Adoption in Ghana: Critical Success Factors

Aims: The study investigated the critical success factors for adopting an e-procurement in public sector procurement activities in Ghana.

Study Design: The study used descriptive survey design.

Place and Duration of Study: The study was carried out among some selected public sector organisations in Ghana from October 2019-January 2020.

Methodology: A total sample size of 215 procurement staff from public entities including: Department of Feeder Roads, Ghana Cocoa Board, Ghana Health Service, Koforidua Technical University and Tema Metropolitan Assembly. The data collection instruments were interview guide and questionnaires. Both descriptive and inferential statistics were used as the analytical tools. Specifically, Principal Component Analysis (PCA) was used.

Results: The study found that users and stakeholders of the e-procurement perceive the availability of reliable, affordable and fast Internet services as the most critical success factor for the adoption of e-Procurement technologies. Furthermore, the study discovered that the critical success factors (CSFs) for e-procurement adoption can be categorized into organisational support for infrastructure set-up, system features, Monitoring and control and supportive human factors.

Conclusion: For e-Procurement technologies to adequately permeate the fabrics of the Ghanaian public procurement system, the government and stakeholders should put in place mechanisms that can help measure the metrics of physical ICT infrastructure provision; attract adequate internet infrastructure into the country and provide the necessary ICT infrastructure and leadership role in using e-Procurement technologies in their public procurement process.