Rating public procurement markets

We develop a novel, scalable method to assess public procurement performance at the tender award stage using standard administrative data. Our measure, which we call the “Market Allocation Imbalance” (MAI), compares how total contract value is distributed across winning firms to how procurement opportunities are distributed across tenders. We show how governance failures can lead to significant deviations of winning firms’ concentration from a theoretical benchmark we derive. We then use procurement data from Ukraine and EU member states in 2018–2021 to assess the MAI of five large sectors, and find that Ukraine’s performance in four of the five is comparable to many other European countries. However, Ukraine’s construction procurement displays large excess concentration among winners, consistent with anecdotal evidence of corruption in this sector. Overall, with minimal data requirements, our method offers a practical tool for comparing the competitiveness of procurement award outcomes across sectors and countries. • We propose a data-light method to rate procurement market quality. • Market Allocation Imbalance benchmarks contract awards against auction opportunities. • Excess concentration flags potential corruption or collusion. • Our findings reveal large variation in procurement quality across sectors. • Ukraine’s construction sector shows extreme excess concentration.