Read@Home: Using the World Bank Bidding Document for Books

This Guidance Note is designed to support government and World Bank teams in preparing accurate and complete bidding documents for books, evaluating proposals, and awarding contracts. The World Bank’s bidding document, Request for Bids – Textbooks and Reading Materials (October 2017), contains what the Purchaser (the government) and the Bidder (prospective supplier to the government) need in order to carry out competitive procurement and contracting of goods (finished books) or services related to book provision (publishing, printing, delivery, and distribution) using Bank funds.

This set of guidance notes is organized in the same sequence as the ten sections of the Bank’s bidding document, from Instructions to Bidders through Contract Forms. Preceding those sections, an introduction provides short refresher notes on the book-related goods and services frequently procured by governments, the typical forms of purchasing for those, and because Bank procurement regulations require competition, the good practices and elapsed time of each activity in the bidding cycle.