GeM Samvaad, a two month long national outreach programme was launched on 17^th December 2019 to reach out to stakeholders across the country and also local sellers in order to facilitate on-boarding of local sellers on the marketplace while catering to specific requirements and procurement needs of buyers.

The outreach programme took off from 19^th December 2019 and during the launch week the States of Karnataka, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh and Andhra Pradesh were covered.

GeM Samvaad is being conducted in all States and Union Territories. After the first four states the outreach programme has been held in J & K on 5^th January, Ladakh on 7^th January, Assam and Bihar on 9^th January and in Chandigarh on 8^th January 2020. All the outreach programmes witnessed overwhelming participation of buyers and sellers. GeM senior officers are steering the programmes. They are also interacting with buyers and sellers attending the events. Arrangements for the outreach programmes including logistics are made by the respective State Governments. The target is to reach out to all stakeholders and learn from their experiences on their usage of GeM portal. Through this outreach programme, GeM expects to make the actual users aware about the new features and functionalities of the portal and collect feedback, which is the first step towards GeM’s ‘Voice of Customer’ initiative.

A Roundtable with Ministries/Departments & Central Public Sector Enterprises (CPSEs) was held on 14 January 2020 in New Delhi as part of GeM Samvaad. It was chaired by Secretary, Department of Commerce, Government of India and CEO GeM.

More than 100 participants including Financial Advisors & nodal officers of Ministries, Departments, and representatives of CPSEs participated in the Roundtable and shared their feedback, challenges and suggestions.

Commerce Secretary highlighted the need for full utilization of the potential of GeM. He stated that Rule 149 of GFR and directives of the Department of Public Enterprises make the procurement of goods and services by Ministries and CPSEs mandatory for goods and services available on GeM and the same should not be violated.

GeM is continuously working to bring all the items on-board and buyers should accelerate this process by providing specifications of categories and asking sellers to on board GeM. He further emphasized the importance of timely payments to sellers and stated that buyers should ensure payments to sellers on time.

State Departments and Organizations and Public Sector Enterprises (PSEs) have been using GeM for their buying needs. Sellers from the States are also benefitting through the access to national Public Procurement market using the portal. Through GeM Samvaad the marketplace is looking forward to receiving feedback from users which will be used for making improvements and advancements in the system.

GeM has more than 15 lakh products and around 20,000 services, more than 3 lakh registered sellers and service providers and more than 40,000 Government buyer organizations. In its short journey of three years, GeM has processed more than 28 lakh orders worth ₹ 40,000 crores in Gross Merchandise Value out of which 50% has been transacted by MSMEs.

Mandatory government procurement on GeM: buyers must use the portal, onboard sellers, and ensure timely payments. Mandatory government procurement through the GeM portal is emphasized as a compliance obligation where goods and services available on the marketplace should be procured via GeM under existing government procurement rules and departmental directives. The Roundtable called for full utilisation of GeM, accelerated onboarding of seller categories, buyer provision of specifications, and assurance of timely payments, while using user feedback to improve the portal.