State of African Public Procurement: What 96,698 Tender Notices Show
Bidanga data on 96,698 public tender notices over 12 months: top countries, buyers and portals, bid deadlines by sector and how little a notice reveals.
Key finding: over the last 12 months, Bidanga collected 96,698 public procurement notices from African buyers and the international organisations that buy in Africa. Three facts stand out. The United Nations system is the single largest publisher, with 31.5% of all notices coming from the UN Global Marketplace (ungm.org). Five national e-procurement portals supply 57.0% of the notices. And only 3.1% of notices state an estimated contract value.
This report summarises what that data shows: who buys, where notices are published, how long suppliers have to respond and how much information a notice really contains. It is refreshed every month from the live database.
How this data was collected
Every figure below comes from notices that Bidanga collected and structured to the Open Contracting Data Standard (OCDS) between 25 October 2025 and 25 October 2026, counted by publication date. Each notice is counted once. A notice is attributed to the country of its procuring entity; 25,339 notices (26.2%) come from buyers that operate across several countries, mostly UN agencies, and are not attributed to a single country.
The figures describe Bidanga's coverage, not the whole African market. Coverage depends on which portals publish machine-readable notices: South Africa, Kenya, Morocco, Ethiopia and Tunisia are covered in depth, while countries without an open portal appear smaller than their real procurement activity. For the same reason, the monthly volume reflects the addition of new sources and should not be read as a market trend.
Which countries publish the most public tenders?
The leading markets are South Africa (18,721, 19.4%), Kenya (13,063, 13.5%), Morocco (10,258, 10.6%), Ethiopia (10,080, 10.4%) and Tunisia (4,171, 4.3%). Together these five markets account for 58.2% of all notices.
| Country | Notices (12 months) | Share |
|---|---|---|
| South Africa | 18,721 | 19.4% |
| Kenya | 13,063 | 13.5% |
| Morocco | 10,258 | 10.6% |
| Ethiopia | 10,080 | 10.4% |
| Tunisia | 4,171 | 4.3% |
| Mozambique | 1,678 | 1.7% |
| Zambia | 1,058 | 1.1% |
| Malawi | 1,038 | 1.1% |
| Nigeria | 985 | 1.0% |
| Ghana | 864 | 0.9% |
| Several countries (mostly UN agencies) | 25,339 | 26.2% |
Who are the biggest buyers?
The UN system dominates. UNDP alone published 9,564 notices, followed by FAO (3,627), ILO (2,762), UNICEF (2,683), UNOPS (1,945) and IOM (1,893). These six agencies account for 22,474 notices, or 23.2% of the total. The largest national buyers are ESKOM (1,522), Kenya Urban Roads Authority (1,187), Murang'a County Government (724) and Nakuru County Government (625).
For suppliers, this concentration has a practical consequence: registering once on the UN Global Marketplace and on the national portals of the target markets gives access to a large share of the visible pipeline. Each UN agency applies its own procurement rules, so the same firm will meet different eligibility and submission requirements from one agency to the next.
Where are notices officially published?
| Source portal | Notices (12 months) | Share |
|---|---|---|
| ungm.org (UN Global Marketplace) | 30,434 | 31.5% |
| etenders.gov.za (South Africa) | 18,666 | 19.3% |
| tenders.go.ke (Kenya) | 12,495 | 12.9% |
| marchespublics.gov.ma (Morocco) | 10,199 | 10.5% |
| egp.gov.et (Ethiopia) | 9,656 | 10.0% |
| projects.worldbank.org (World Bank) | 5,600 | 5.8% |
| tuneps.tn (Tunisia) | 4,066 | 4.2% |
The top five national portals (South Africa, Kenya, Morocco, Ethiopia and Tunisia) supply 55,082 notices, 57.0% of the total. In these countries the national portal is the reference channel for any bidder targeting the market.
Which sectors generate the most tenders?
Construction is the largest sector with 20,231 notices (20.9%), ahead of education (13,321, 13.8%), IT and telecom (9,941, 10.3%), water and sanitation (7,119, 7.4%) and supplies (6,070, 6.3%). A further 15,883 notices (16.4%) do not fit a single sector. Sector pages on Bidanga list the open tenders of each category: construction, education, IT and telecom, water and sanitation.
How long do suppliers have to submit a bid?
The median time between publication and the submission deadline ranges from 12 days (health) to 23 days (agriculture, construction and water and sanitation). The calculation uses only notices that state both dates.
| Sector | Median days to deadline | Notices used |
|---|---|---|
| Health | 12 | 3,949 |
| Education | 13 | 9,360 |
| Consulting and studies | 14 | 3,044 |
| Supplies | 15 | 4,876 |
| Audit and finance | 16 | 2,455 |
| Energy | 18 | 2,027 |
| Transport | 20 | 2,110 |
| IT and telecom | 21 | 5,580 |
| Agriculture | 23 | 1,382 |
| Construction | 23 | 14,463 |
| Water and sanitation | 23 | 5,712 |
Two to three weeks is a short time to obtain a bid security, gather company documents and price an offer. A supplier who learns about a notice a few days after publication loses a large part of that window, which is why alerts matter more than searching by hand.
How much information does a notice contain?
Less than most bidders expect. Only 3.1% of notices (3,045) state an estimated contract value, so the size of an opportunity usually has to be judged from the technical documents. And 79.8% of notices do not state the procurement method. Among the 19,564 notices that do, the split is open tendering (76.3%), selective tendering (17.1%), limited tendering (5.7%) and direct award (0.9%).
For bidders, this means the notice is only a starting point: the tender documents, eligibility criteria and submission instructions have to be downloaded and read in full before deciding whether to bid.
What this means for suppliers
Three practical conclusions follow from the data. First, a small number of channels carries most of the visible opportunities: the UN Global Marketplace and five national portals supply 88% of notices. Second, response windows are short, so early detection is a competitive advantage. Third, notices rarely give the value or the procedure, so screening opportunities requires reading the documents, not just the headline.
Bidanga aggregates these sources in one search and sends free email alerts by country, sector and keyword. Country pages give the live picture for each market, for example South Africa, Kenya, Morocco and Ethiopia.
Using this data
Journalists, researchers and organisations may quote these figures with a link to this page, citing "Bidanga, State of African Public Procurement, October 2026". Figures are recalculated each month; the date at the top of the page shows the latest update.