The National Bank of Ethiopia has opened bids of five international companies for printing of standardized checkbooks.

The NBE floated a tender for the supply of MICR enabled cheques in May 2013 following a decision by the central bank and Ethiopian Bankers Association to standardize cheques with additional security features in order to speed up cheque clearing and settlement with security.

Accordingly all checkbooks issued by every Ethiopian will be printed centrally through the National Bank of Ethiopia following a standardized format.

The NBE  has opened technical proposals of ET-CON PLC, Sudan Currency Printing Press, Tall Printing, De La Rue, Madras Secure Printing and Manipal Group for initial review.

The procurement team of the NBE has disqualified ET-CON PLC and Sudan Currency Printing Press for failing to comply with the bid requirements.

Proposals from the remaining bidders is referred for further evaluation by a bid committee starting this week.

Source: Fortune