University of Twente
Makerere University Business School
Moses Muhwezi is a PhD student at the University of Twente (Enschede). He is also working at Makerere University Business School (Kampala). The research, he is currently working on is: Horizontal collaborative purchasing in developing countries: The case of government ministries, local authorities, and universities in Uganda.
PhD Research
Collaboration involves joint action and is a reliable way of creating value for
money. It is an arrangement, formal or informal, where different organizational
units work together. This enables them among others, to have accurate
information, lower procurement costs, improve asset and capacity utilization,
eliminate barriers caused by distance and time, and use scarce human resources
efficiently. Various studies about collaboration have been undertaken,
especially in developed countries. More so, such collaboration studies have been
in various disciplines, and there is notable limitation of scholarly work in the
emerging and strategic purchasing discipline in developing countries.
This research is about investigating, analyzing and suggesting best working horizontal collaborative mechanisms in developing countries, and specifically in Uganda. We will try to answer the following questions during the project: What is the current state of collaboration in Uganda? Here, we shall find out how different public units (ministries, local authorities and universities) carry out purchasing collaboration, by finding out what products/services/works, the organizational forms used, initial factors for collaboration, and its appreciation. After this phase, we shall go on to study the behavioral factors that affect a successful horizontal purchasing collaboration, like trust, commitment, dependence, and reciprocity. We shall go on to investigate the role of other factors in purchasing collaboration. These include organizational structure, sharing mechanisms, culture, legal provisions, communication between the parties, their sizes, internal support and influence. We shall then make scientifically based suggestions on how to start or improve a purchasing collaboration initiative.