The number of public procurement tenders was up 145pc in the first half of 2010 from one year earlier, but their combined value declined 6pc, Jozsef Bakonyi, chairman of the Public Procurement Council said on Thursday.

There were 4,356 public procurements in H1, up 145pc from one year earlier. Their value fell 6pc to HUF 708.8bn.

Construction investments accounted for 55pc of the value of the public procurement projects, up from 46.6pc.

Municipalities accounted for 37.1pc of the value of the public procurements. Public sector organisations took second place with 32.5pc.

The major increase in the number of procedures is due to the fact that simple procedures also appeared in the statistics from April last year, while such procedures were not included earlier.

Open procedures accounted for 18pc in terms of the number of procedures and 49pc in terms of value.

The number of negotiated procedures took second place, making up 9.7pc of procedures in terms of the number of procedures and 24.4pc in value terms.

Micro-, small and medium-sized businesses won 79.2pc of the procedures compared to 72.5pc one year earlier.

The number of complaints submitted to the Public Procurement Arbitration Board (KDB) rose to 533 in the first half of 2010 from 337 in H1 2009. KDB found infringements in 208 cases and levied fines of HUF 205m.

Mr Bakonyi noted that if last week's amendment to the public procurement act is officially announced, a new Public Procurement Council must be appointed within 16 days.