Skip to main content
European Commission logo
Public Buyers Community
News article12 December 2023

Supporting European SMEs to participate in public procurement outside the EU

picture AV portal

“Supporting European SMEs to participate in public procurement outside the EU” is an initiative funded by the European Commission, launched in 2020 and currently under implementation. It aims at helping and improving Small and Medium-sized Enterprises’ (SMEs) access to public procurement in the non-EU countries with which the European Union has signed a bilateral or plurilateral agreement covering public procurement. 

The European Innovation Council and SMEs Executive Agency (EISMEA) manages the implementation of this action, funded under the programme for the Competitiveness of Enterprises and Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (COSME).  

The selected consortia are carrying out a set of activities embedded in a double-stage implementation approach: 

  1. A preparatory phase, leading to the development of a joint internationalisation strategy towards specific third countries and a roadmap for its implementation. This phase has been completed. 

  1. An implementation phase, encompassing the actual enforcement of the internationalisation strategy and the development of business support and tools for accessing public procurement markets outside the EU with a view to help a vast number of SMEs operating in different non-EU countries and sectors. 

Following a call for proposals, six projects (with a duration ranging between 32 and 36 months) were selected. They target 11 sectors, and 14 non-EU countries. These are: 

  • Pro-SME: consortium of three partners, targeting the sectors of infrastructures, water, environment waste management and ICT in Colombia, Canada, Switzerland and Ukraine.  

  • P2GreenEST: consortium of four partners, targeting the sectors of circular economy, sustainable water management, waste management and energy production in Moldova and Ukraine and Serbia.  

  • GREENERG-PRO: consortium of three partners, targeting the sector of green business in Israel, Taiwan, Vietnam and Singapore. 

  • EXTRA LIGHT: consortium of five partners, targeting the sector of lighting industry in USA, Canada and Japan.  

  • GOOSE: consortium of 4 partners, targeting the sectors of green economy, smart health, ICT and smart cities in Japan, Norway, Serbia, Chile, Colombia and Vietnam.  

  • S-ACCESS: consortium of 7 partners, targeting the sector of railway technologies in USA, Canada and Norway. 

Following the Russian aggression against Ukraine, two of the projects targeting this country (ProSME and P2GreenEST), while managing to produce the country analysis (reports available on the project websites), could not deploy the planned activities on the field. In this regard, P2greenEST was amended to include another target country (Serbia). Despite the difficulties, the support towards Ukraine has remained active in both projects. For instance, ProSME attended the Rebuild Ukraine conference, a remarkable exposition of construction technologies, equipment and materials, green technologies, global achievements of construction and energy industries. 

At present, project beneficiaries are engaging in target missions to the respective third countries and working on relevant recommendation to policy makers in line with their internationalisation strategies and experience on the field. 

Although final results will only be available after the end of the projects (by the end of summer 2024), current figures evince the positive impact that these projects are having for EU-based SMEs willing to engage in public procurement opportunities in foreign markets.