Information about US Contracts from the security-military sector in Latin America
Federal Business Opportunities (FedBizOpps) is a web-based system that the U.S. government employs to post contracting solicitations and other procurement-related opportunities on the Internet. FedBizOpps is run by the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA), Acquisition Systems Division (ASD), designated by the Federal Acquisition Regulation as the mandatory "government wide point of entry for the posting government business opportunities greater than $25,000.”
Though it is designed for corporations seeking to do business with the U.S. government, the page is also a very useful resource for citizens who wish to know how foreign assistance funds – including some security assistance – are being spent. Here is an Excel spreadsheet of notable contracts currently offered on the FedBizOpps site.
Another site reports about contracts awarded in the past. The extensive database at www.usaspending.gov can be searched by “country of performance” of a contract, as well as the “recipient location” country. This site provides results dating back as early as 2000, but offers much less detail than FedBizOpps about what each contract involves.
We have reviewed the FedBizOpps website for solicitations made in the past year for security and military-related projects in Latin American countries. (The Fellowship of Reconciliation recently highlighted information revealed by these and other sources about construction projects in the region.)
Some interesting observations arise:
- Colombia holds the highest number of solicitations and procurement-related opportunities. The Department of the Army is the agency that published the most notices involving Colombia in the past year. Many of its requests are for construction and aviation-related activities. An example of this is the notice to award a Firm Fixed Price contract for construction and related services for an “Intel Fusion Center” in the municipality of La Macarena, department of Meta, Colombia. The estimated construction cost for this project is between $100,000 and $250,000 dollars. Another example is the solicitation of a Firm Fixed Price contract for a “Scan Eagle Flight Operator / Subject Matter Expert (SME)” for the La Macarena area.
- Many of the contracts offered for Colombia are not only for maintenance and repair of military equipment or construction of military facilities; there are also contracts offered for building roads and hospitals. For example, there is a request for a contractor to renovate a community center/disaster shelter in San Sebastian, Cauca, Colombia. Similar solicitations exist for other countries like Panama and Peru. In Panama, the Department of the Army has published two solicitations for construction of new clinics, one in Playa Muerto and one in Alto Caballero. In Peru, there is a request for a contract to provide the production, editing and broadcasting of a total of six radio spots.
- These social construction notices are requested by the Department of the Army indicating that the responsible agency in these cases is the military. It is surprising that social infrastructure-related projects are not the province of USAID.
- Many of these contracts are to be carried out in dangerous areas of Colombia. Contract locations in Colombia include highly conflictive areas like La Macarena, San Vicente del Caguán, Uribe, San José del Guaviare, and Tumaco. These are zones in which guerrilla and paramilitary activity is frequent. Contractors operating in these zones do so at some risk.
- Though it is the region’s second-largest recipient of military and police assistance, work in Mexico appears rarely among the contract solicitations. The FedBizOpps website lists only a few notices involving Mexico in the last year. These solicitations mostly look for American personnel to work at the U.S. embassy or mission in Mexico. The explanation for this trend is well known: unlike Colombia, Mexico is reluctant to allow a significant U.S. military presence on its territory. As a result, military contractor operations have also been less frequent.
- Some published notices by the U.S. Department of State show requests from the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL) in Colombia and Mexico for in-country local police institutions. For example, one request for Colombia calls for “administrative, technical, maintenance, training, and logistics/procurement support to the Colombian National Police Aviation program (ARAVI) that operates throughout Colombia supporting the counter-narcotics effort.” There is another solicitation for a PSC (personal service contractor) to serve under the Department of State for INL, in the US embassy in Mexico City.
In general, the level of transparency indicated here is to be applauded. Researchers in Latin American countries find it far harder to find information on how government agencies, especially the military, spend their budgets. The level of access to information and detail provided by the FedBizOpps website is positive and welcome.