Southern Africa Development Community Secretariat – Procurement and Grants Policy Article 23. Limited Bidding (1) The Limited Bidding method is essentially the Restricted Bidding method with the exception that the shortlist is established by the Procuring Entity without prequalification or open advertisement. (2) Under this method, the Procuring Entity restricts the issue of bidding documents to a limited number of specified economic operators when: a) the goods, works, or services required are of a specialised nature or can only be obtained from a limited number of specialised economic operators or reputable sources, all of whom are known to the Procuring Entity; or b) the time and cost of considering a large number of bids is disproportionate to the value of the procurement; or c) there is an urgent need for the goods, works or services so that there would be insufficient time for the Procuring Entity to engage in open bidding, provided that the circumstances giving rise to the urgency could not have been foreseen by the Procuring Entity and have not been caused by dilatory conduct on its part. d) It falls within the thresholds established for it in the Procurement Regulations. (3) This method shall only be deployed with prior approval of the Tender Committee (unless it falls within the thresholds established for it in the Procurement Regulations) and if it has been fully demonstrated that any of the conditions as laid out in section 1 (a) to (c) of this article have been met. (4) Under this method, the shortlist shall consist of a minimum of three (3) economic operators and the Procuring Entity shall receive at least two (2) responsive bids/quotations/proposals. The Procuring Entity must justify the choice of the economic operators invited to participate. (5) The lowest evaluated bid i.e. the bid complying with all criteria stated in the bidding documents shall be subjected to post qualification. Article 24. Negotiated Procedure (1) The Negotiated Procedure method is a procurement method that allows the Procuring Entity to negotiate, with one or several economic operators, the technical, financial and commercial conditions of a contract. (2) The Negotiated Procedure has two methods of application as follow: (a) Negotiated Procedure with Publication. This method entails that the Procuring Entity launches an open invitation to all interested economic operators to participate in a two stages bidding process. During the first stage, the interested economic operators are invited to submit un-priced technical proposals on the basis of a conceptual/preliminary design or performance specifications. Upon review of the first stage proposals, the Procuring Entity will invite bidders to negotiate improved technical proposal, discuss commercial conditions of contract and provide any other clarification as necessary. Subject to specific request for improvement of their proposals as well as general amendments of the bidding documents, the bidders will be further invited to summit final technical and financial proposals at the second stage. Following the second stage evaluation, the Procurement Entity shall invite the successful bidder to negotiate the contract. (b) Negotiated Procedure without Publication. This method entails that the Procuring Entity 20