Procurement professionalization in challenging environments: The cases of Afghanistan and Nigeria (Live Event) OVERVIEW The World Bank has been supporting the professionalization of public procurement to help strengthen the skills and competencies of practitioners and make the delivery of goods, services, and works to citizens more efficient. In Afghanistan, the National Procurement Authority, through Civil Services Commission, has developed a Procurement Cadre Regulation and recruited about 1000 procurement staff. The National Procurement Institute has developed systematic training, certification, and accreditation of staff. This was part of the Fiscal Performance Support Project with support from the World Bank. In Nigeria, the World Bank-funded Sustainable Procurement, Environmental and Social Standards Enhancement Project (SPESSE) is supporting six federal universities to graduate 21,240 students in Procurement, Environmental and Social Standards (PES). The project is also helping central government agencies to commence professionalization programs in PES.