"RFPs put people in competition with each other, they do not encourage collaboration"

- panelist at a public health event I am attending

But doesn't any funding mechanism that has a fixed amount of money to give away put people in competition with each other? What are the best ways to minimize this?

RFPs = bidding to complete the project. the only downside I can see is that involved parties might externalize some other nth-order opportunity/nuance. seems like the fixed scope & oversimplified design is more the issue, maybe RFPs should be grounded to a much larger picture & lose out if cooperation isn't complete.