Índice de Riesgos de Corrupción en México

Corruption and impunity are the main causes of citizens’ anger and polarization in Mexico. The recent history of the country’s democracy is plagued with cases of embezzlement and diversion of public funds meant to provide basic services to the population. Most of these scandals are related to public procurement and the policies and platforms that operationalize it. Mexico’s public procurement e-platform CompraNet, is an example of a great idea poorly implemented. To analyze it and diagnose the quality of public procurement, IMCO compared international standards in public procurement and Mexican regulations to create a benchmark. Using an automated search robot, big data tools, and public information consultations through several sources, IMCO analyzed hundreds of thousands of procurement procedures and contracts from federal government. This project is based on a database of 230 million cells of information, describing 700,000 procurement procedures from 2012 through 2017. This evidence was used to build a Corruption Risk Index, that evaluates the level of risk of 1,537 government purchasing units. Based on the evidence, IMCO’s analysis concludes that CompraNet is complex procurement system, insufficient, incomplete, and non-articulated. The project also demonstrates the potential of technology and data to mitigate and fight against corruption risks.