"Public Sector Procurement Reform Act of 2001." Rationale: It is the policy of the Philippine government to ensure that transparency and equal opportunity for all prospective bidders characterize public procurement process. These are important towards ensuring that public procurement is an efficient and effictive process. Unfortunately, different and sometimes conflicting laws, rules and regulations characterize the country's public procurement. > The presence of these problems in the procurement process can be readily addressed with a legislation that will remove conflicts and arbitrariness in existing procurement laws and rules and regulations. There is a need to shift the procurement emphasis from pre-qualificati on to simple eligibiliity screening and post qualification, using transparent and non-discretiona ry criteria. This will allow for more bidders, lowered government costs and reduced procurement time by as much as six months.