Procurement as a strategic lever: Can EU rules deliver competitiveness, green goals and fair markets?

On 15 October 2025, the European Commission published its Evaluation of the EU Public Procurement Directives, which were adopted in 2014.

With an average annual value of EUR 616 billion, i.e. three times the size of the EU budget, the EU Public Procurement Directives govern a substantial portion of public authorities within the EU. Aim of these Public Procurement Directives is to ensure efficient public spending, competition, and anti-corruption, which are important for the EU internal market to function properly. The key objectives of the 2014’s revision were to simplify procurement procedures, give authorities more flexibility, ensure fair access—especially for SMEs—and secure better value for money. At the same time, the EU Public Procurement Directives also aimed to support sustainability, social goals, and innovation, with a strong focus on digital tools and eProcurement to make processes faster, clearer, and less burdensome. To assess these objectives, the Commission evaluated the Directives covering the period 2016-2024.

In short, the Evaluation found that the EU Public Procurement Directives only partly achieved their goals. Legal clarity and flexibility have not improved, while new sector rules resulted in creating more complexity. Furthermore, although it follows from the Evaluation that transparency has increased and the value of contracts doubled, the corruption risks remain, which is further strengthened by the fact that data gaps persist, which make it difficult to assess compliance. The Evaluation of the competition objective also shows mixed results; briefly put, there are fewer bids per tender, yet SMEs still win most contracts. Interestingly, digitalisation, including eProcurement, accelerated progress, but tools like the ESPD did not fully meet the expectations. Another observation is that cross-border procurement is still low, whilst the concerns about non-EU suppliers are rising. Finally, the Evaluation finds that progress on green, social, and innovative procurement varies widely across Member States. A perhaps overlooked detail in this evaluation is the effect of various other types of legislation (particularly EU ESG legislation, e.g., the CSDDD, the NZIA, and the EUDR) on the EU procurement law, whilst they do not actually revise the EU Public Procurement. Consequently, external coherence of EU public procurement law is weakened because many other EU laws now include their own procurement rules. This has led to fragmentation and differences in terminology, scope, and reporting requirements across legislation; causing also legal uncertainty. Overall, the Evaluation concludes that, generally speaking, the EU Public Procurement Directives lack the agility, coherence and strategic focus needed to respond effectively to current, and emerging challenges.

Notably, this evaluation marks another step in the process of revising these Directives. In light thereof, the European Commission’s President Von Der Leyen has announced this revision as part of the EU’s strategic agenda, including the introduction of “made in EU” criteria for certain strategic sectors. The key question that remains is how—and to what extent—the findings will translate into legislative proposals to revise the EU Public Procurement Directives in accordance with Commission’s recent resilience and simplification strategy. The European Commission has opened a 12-week consultation until 26 January 2026, seeking input and evidence to inform the review of the EU Public Procurement Directives. It is expected that the Commission will publish its legislative proposal to revise the EU Public Procurement in 2026.