CIPS Practitioner Corporate Award Sample

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CIPS Assignment Example: Sourcing Essentials

Executive Summary

This report evaluates how UN Women (Pakistan) applies four distinct sourcing approaches: E-Sourcing, WEPs-Based Partnerships, Gender-Responsive Procurement (GRP), and Direct, Ethical Sourcing to deliver value-for-money while advancing sustainability, gender equality, and ethical procurement. Operating under the stringent UN and local Pakistani regulatory frameworks, the organisation fuses global best-practices with a strong social mandate to ensure procurement decisions achieve transformative social impact and operational efficiency.

When applied to ICT and software license procurement, e-sourcing leverages digital platforms such as UNGM and Quantum ERP to widen supplier participation, achieve procurement transparency, and reduce contract cycle times at UN Women (Pakistan). Although cost-effective and scalable, e-sourcing requires mitigation measures to include the rural and digitally marginalised cohort of suppliers.

WEPs-Based partnerships connect UN Women (Pakistan)’s procurement processes to gender equality outcomes by engaging compliant suppliers with the trademark Women’s Empowerment Principles. When applied to the capacity-building services category spend, this collaborative model builds sustainable, long-term value (but demands major investment in supplier development to avoid dependency).

Notably, the GRP approach inculcates gender considerations across procurement cycles, particularly for goods and services from local women-owned SMEs in rural Pakistan. It drives socio-economic empowerment at the grassroots level; although systematic expansion, targeted capacity-building, and redefinition of value-for-money beyond price alone are required to drive its sustainability.

Lastly, direct, ethical sourcing ensures traceability and fairness in procuring artisan goods or training materials directly from marginalised Pakistani producers. Direct procurement bypasses exploitative intermediaries, thereby delivering strong reputational benefits and consequently sustains local livelihoods – albeit with higher oversight and logistical challenges.

The report also introduces a weighted supplier appraisal checklist prioritising gender equality, ethical standards, service quality, and long-term sustainability. Implementating the proposed appraisal checklist will strengthen supplier selection, manage procurement risks, uphold sourcing transparency, and build readiness among underserved suppliers.

The strategic recommendations call for an integrated sourcing policy manual, province-wide supplier development programmes, data-driven performance dashboards, scaling GRP to high-value contracts, and piloting blockchain-based traceability for ethical sourcing. Collectively, these actions will consolidate UN Women (Pakistan)’s position as a leader in socially responsible and impact-driven procurement.

 

 

Content Outline

1.0 Introduction

1.1 UN Women (Pakistan) Sourcing Context

1.2 Strategic Frameworks and Analysis Models

2.0 E-Sourcing

2.1 Overview

2.2 Category of Spend: ICT Equipment and Software Licences

2.3 Justification and Strategic Analysis

2.4 Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats (SWOT)

2.5 Evaluative Commentary

3.0 WEPs-Based Partnerships

3.1 Overview

3.2 Application to Category of Spend

3.3 Justification

3.4 SWOT Analysis

3.5 Commentary

4.0 Gender-Responsive Procurement (GRP)

4.1 Overview of GRP in the UN Women (Pakistan) Context

4.2 Sourcing Goods and Services from Local Women-Owned SMEs as a Leverage Spend Category

4.3 Strategic Justification

4.4 Barriers and Enablers

4.5 Evaluation

5.0 Direct, Ethical Sourcing

5.1 Rationale

5.2 Spend Category: Rural Artisan Goods and Training Materials

5.3 Strategic Fit

5.4 Risk Management and Control Mechanisms

5.5 Analysis

6.0 Supplier Appraisal Checklist

6.1 Strategic Importance of Supplier Appraisal

6.2 Appraisal Criteria and Dimensions

6.3 Proposed Supplier Appraisal Checklist (Weighted)

6.3.1 Weighting Rationale

6.4 Alignment with UN and Public Sector Standards

6.5 Implementation and Strategic Impact

7.0 Conclusion

8.0 Recommendations

9.0 References

10.0 Bibliography

11.0 Appendices

Appendix 1: UN Women (Pakistan) Procurement Framework Overview

Appendix 2: E-Sourcing Steps in UN Women (Pakistan)

Appendix 3: WEPs-Based Partnership Screening Criteria

Appendix 4: Sample Gender-Responsive Procurement (GRP) Criteria

Appendix 5: GRP Supplier Readiness Evaluation Checklist

Appendix 6: Direct Ethical Sourcing Principles

Appendix 7: Key Stakeholders in the Sourcing Process

Appendix 8: Risk Register for UN Women Procurement

Appendix 9: Sourcing Strategy Checklist

Appendix 10: Sample Evaluation Matrix (WEPs/GRP Combined)

Appendix 11: Model Contract (Screenshots)

 

 

1.0 Introduction

In a complex global procurement landscape, the UN Women (Pakistan)’s mission of inclusive development, gender equality, and sustainable procurement stands out due to strategic choice of sourcing approaches. Unlike commercial entities, however, the UN does not pursue outsourcing or profit-driven sourcing practices but instead uses approaches as dictated by ethical, rights-based, and inclusive frameworks (UN Women, 2022). When powered by underlying frameworks such as the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UNSDGs) and Women’s Empowerment Principles (WEPs), procurement goes beyond organisational efficiency to exemplify inclusive, ethical, and impact-driven outcomes (CIPS, 2023). In support of the UN Women (Pakistan) procurement principles are models like the Kraljic Matrix, the Sourcing Continuum, Total Cost of Ownership (TCO), and Porter’s Five Forces that help to analyse the sourcing environment. Based on factors such as strengths, risks, and opportunities, a comprehensive supplier appraisal checklist was developed with a special focus on locally-produced services recommending a selection practice that complements UN Women’s ethical mandates, Pakistani procurement legislation, and value-for-money standards.

 

1.1 UN Women (Pakistan) Sourcing Context

Procurement at UN Women (Pakistan) is guided by internal and global frameworks including: UNGM and UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) policies (especially Goal 5 and Goal 17); Women’s Empowerment Principles (WEPs) which promote inclusive supply chains; the UN Procurement Manual; and local compliance structures – including partnerships with Pakistani provincial women’s commissions / ministries and national Financial Rules (UN Women, 2024). This intricate sourcing environment presents constraints and enablers: for example, UN Women (Pakistan) faces restrictions on vendor engagement requiring strict due diligence or adherence to UN’s global frameworks that promote transparent, collaborative sourcing as illustrated in the table below:

 

 

UN Women (Pakistan) Procurement Drivers and Constraints

Procurement Drivers	Procurement Constraints
Compliance with SDG 5 & Gender Equality Mandate	A limited GRP-ready pool of vendors
Transparency & Accountability Standards (UN Financial Regulations and Rules)	Risk-averse bureaucracy and rigid rules delaying approvals
Stakeholder (Donors, partner agencies and community) scrutiny	Fragmented sourcing systems
Value-for-Money + Social Impact Mandate (supplier inclusion, women’s empowerment)	Resistance to change in sourcing processes

 

Fig. 1: A table showing UN Women (Pakistan) procurement drivers and constraints.

 

 

The procurement categories span across ICT, capacity building, and locally-produced services; with each spend category corresponding to a unique sourcing strategy depending on spend value, risk profile, and supplier availability. For example, collaboration with women-led businesses and social enterprises for catering services and branded materials is encouraged under the Gender-Responsive Procurement (GRP) Toolkit while an e-sourcing option ensures traceable compliance in high-value ICT procurement (UN Women, 2022). Notably, the UN Procurement Practitioner’s Handbook (2021) discourages outsourcing due to the inherent risks of value dilution, reduced control, and accountability issues. The aim of this study is to evaluate the contextual relevance, application, and the implications for value creation to four supplier relationship models including E-Sourcing, WEPs-Based Partnerships, Gender-Responsive Procurement (GRP), and Direct, Ethical Sourcing with specific categories of spend as shown in the figure below:

 

 

Fig. 2: Sourcing approaches versus spend categories at UN Women (Pakistan).

 

1.2 Strategic Frameworks and Analysis Models

UN Women (Pakistan) operates under a highly regulated procurement environment governed by the UN Financial Regulations, General Conditions of Contract, and the UN Global Marketplace (UNGM) protocols (UN Women, 2024). All procurement decisions are made pursuant to strict adherence with ethical standards, transparency, value for money, and inclusion especially regarding women-owned businesses and suppliers from underrepresented sectors (UNGM, 2023). The sourcing approaches will therefore be analysed using frameworks such as Porter’s Five Forces, the Kraljic’s Matrix, and Sustainable Procurement Maturity Models chosen for their deep strategic lens. The recommended supplier appraisal checklist updates are considerate of risks, organisational / supplier capacity, compliance, and gender equity indicators.

 

2.0 E-Sourcing

E-sourcing refers to the use of digital platforms and technologies to manage sourcing activities including but not limited to supplier identification, tendering, evaluation, and contract award (Auriemma, 2023) as shown in the diagram:

 

Fig. 3: A sample E-Sourcing workflow diagram.

 

2.1 Overview

Primarily, the UN Women (Pakistan) carries out e-sourcing through the UNGM systems and a cloud-based procurement platform, Quantum ERP, to facilitate the key public sector principles of transparency, competitive bidding, and auditability (UNGM, 2023; UN Women, 2024) and cognisant to the CIPS (2023) guidance on digital procurement. The UN Women favours e-sourcing because the approach encourages wider participation from Pakistani SMEs and women-owned businesses, enhances corporate visibility, and significantly reduces procurement cycle times (Ramirez & Lee, 2023).

 

2.2 Category of Spend: ICT Equipment and Software Licences

UN Women (Pakistan) regularly procures ICT assets like laptops, video conferencing systems, cybersecurity tools, and enterprise software to support programming needs and daily operations across remote offices in Balochistan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, or Sindh. Following an analysis of Porter’s Five Forces (Choi & Carter, 2023), this category of spend is ideal for e-sourcing due to the demand for high specification clarity (standardised products), the presence of a strong competition in local and regional markets, the large number of qualified vendors on the UNGM platform, and the relatively low risk, non-strategic classification of ICT equipment and software licenses according to the Kraljic (1983) matrix. At UN Women (Pakistan), e-sourcing follows a structured process where shortlisted vendors are invited via Request for Quotation (RFQ) or Invitation to Bid (ITB). Next, all supplier responses are digitally logged, evaluated, and compared using pre-programmed weighted criteria in the Quantum ERP system for objectivity (UN Women, 2023b).

 

2.3 Justification and Strategic Analysis

The following table illustrates the rationale behind e-sourcing for ICT equipment and software licences at UN Women (Pakistan) using key sourcing models:

 

Criteria	Analysis
Kraljic Matrix Classification	●     Leverage Item: High supply risk, high impact ●     Several suppliers available ●     Cost-sensitive.
Supplier Relationship Type	●     Transactional: Limited interaction post-contract ●     Commoditised market.
Porter’s Five Forces	●     High Supplier Competition ●     Low Buyer Switching Costs ●     Low Risk of New Entrants due to standardisation
Market Type	●     Perfect Competition due to multiple prequalified suppliers on the UNGM/Quantum ERP systems
Sourcing Impact	●     Enables price discovery ●     Fosters inclusion of diverse suppliers including women-led MSMEs
Digital Procurement Trend	●     Matches the UN system-wide digitalisation goals and SDG 12 (Responsible Consumption & Production)

Fig. 4: An analysis of UN Women (Pakistan) rationale for e-sourcing ICT equipment and software licenses.

 

2.4 Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats (SWOT)

E-sourcing can create barriers for small, rural vendors without access to IT tools or digital skills – thus, UN Women mitigates this bias with capacity-building webinars and help-desk support in local languages during procurement cycles in sync with the World Bank (2022) inclusive procurement principles as fully described in the table below:

 

Aspect	Description
Strengths	●     Transparent ●     Cost-efficient ●     Scalable across categories ●     Mitigates corruption
Weaknesses	●     Limited flexibility during negotiations ●     Assumes digital literacy among suppliers
Opportunities	●     Enables procurement analytics ●     Supports supplier diversity monitoring
Threats	●     Excludes vendors in rural Pakistan with poor connectivity or no UNGM registration.

Fig. 5: A SWOT analysis of the UN Women (Pakistan) e-sourcing approach.

 

2.5 Evaluative Commentary

The non-strategic e-sourcing strategy demonstrates a high affinity to UN’s public sector procurement goals: value for money, auditability, gender responsiveness, and fairness (UN Women, 2025). However, e-sourcing only suits categories like ICT and basic supplies but is less ideal for services requiring qualitative judgement or co-creation such as research consultancy and behaviour change campaigns at UN Women (Pakistan) according to Chinwe & Batool (2023) literature. Therefore, whereas e-sourcing is efficient on transactional spend, it must be augmented by offline dialogue or pre-bid conferences where the spend category involves strategic or ambiguous deliverables. Additionally, UN Women (Pakistan) must routinely monitor supplier feedback on the procurement platform’s accessibility to confirm the sourcing tools do not inadvertently reinforce structural inequalities particularly among women-owned rural enterprises (Suleiman & Chowdhury, 2022).

 

3.0 WEPs-Based Partnerships

The Women’s Empowerment Principles (WEPs) is a joint initiative by UN Women and UN Global Compact which serves as a framework for promoting gender equality across the value chain as UN Women (2023) asserts. Typically, a WEPs-based partnership involves technical assistance, joint training, and shared monitoring as per the UNSDG 5 (Gender Equality) and UNSDG 17 (Partnerships for the Goals) chapters. Notably, WEPs differ from conventional supplier relationships in that they are developmental, collaborative, and long-term oriented; making them suitable for connecting procurement to sustainable UN Women (Pakistan) development objectives as the figure below illustrates.

 

Fig. 6: How  UN Women (Pakistan) WEPs-based partnerships connect sourcing to the UNSDG development goals.

 

3.1 Overview

UN Women (Pakistan) actively engages with its WEPs signatories to co-create gender-inclusive procurement ecosystems by applying the principles as a strategic sourcing lens, not just a supplier screening mechanism.

 

3.2 Application to Category of Spend

UN Women (Pakistan) frequently commissions service providers for capacity building and gender training services like gender audits, feminist training modules, capacity-building of police or judiciary, and national policy consultations (UN Global Compact, 2022). These services are classified as a strategic spend due to their high impact on programming outcomes, the limited number of competent and compliant service providers, and the high co-dependence on shared UN Women (Pakistan) values and the sourcing approach. The organisation, therefore, only seeks local suppliers already subscribing to the WEPs tenets, or those willing to fully adopt feminist principles and participatory ethics to ensure a consistent delivery.

 

3.3 Justification

The following table uses selected CIPS frameworks to justify the strategic fit of WEPs-based partnerships under this spend category:

 

Model	Application
Kraljic Matrix	●     Strategic Item: High risk, high value ●     Tailored delivery ●     Long-term relational investment
Sourcing Strategy	●     Collaborative/Developmental: Mutual learning, innovation, shared goals
Supplier Preference Matrix	●     Core Supplier: Few high-value providers ●     Deeply integrated
Contract Type	●     Output-based with KPIs: Gender inclusion metrics, training quality, behavioural impact
Supplier Enablement	●     Supplier support in WEPs adoption, joint branding in advocacy initiatives
UN Procurement Manual Alignment	●     Conforms with “best value for money” through quality and social impact, not just price

Fig. 7: A strategic evaluation of WEPs-based partnerships for gender training services.

 

3.4 SWOT Analysis

 

The table below summarises a strategic SWOT analysis of WEPs-based partnerships for capacity-building and gender training services:

 

 

Aspect	Description
Strengths	●     Enhances brand alignment, quality assurance, and gender impact
Weaknesses	●     Long supplier onboarding process ●     Requires resource investment in supplier development
Opportunities	●     Influences market norms, develops local feminist expertise
Threats	●     Risk of overdependence on limited number of aligned suppliers ●     Potential for drift in mission

Fig. 8: A SWOT analysis of WEPs-based partnerships at UN Women (Pakistan).

 

3.5 Commentary

The UN Women WEPs-based partnerships transfigures procurement from a traditionally transactional function into a strategic tool for social transformation. At the “Engage” and “Influence” stages, the WEPs approach exemplifies CIPS’ Responsible Sourcing Model; especially as it significantly shapes supplier behaviour beyond contractual compliance (CIPS, 2022). The capacity-building service category at UN Women (Pakistan) is particularly suitable for a WEPs-based partnership because feminist expertise is rarely found and cannot be commodified – under these circumstances, shared political values, relational capital, and mutual understanding are more valuable than any market competition.

However, UN Women (Pakistan) should continue its efforts to broaden the supplier base to avoid supplier dependency and enhance resilience by nurturing emerging feminist consultancies in underrepresented rural provinces. Furthermore, a tiered partnership model which categorises suppliers as Mentors, Learners, or Champions based on their WEPs engagement level with UN Women could help diversify the impact and to target investments more efficiently (OECD, 2022).

 

4.0 Gender-Responsive Procurement (GRP)

As a routine sourcing approach, Gender-Responsive Procurement (GRP) infuses gender considerations across the procurement cycle – everything from the market analysis and tender design to the contract award and supplier evaluation – as discussed by the Amos (2024) studies. In the context of UN Women (Pakistan), GRP sourcing for routine spend categories operationalise gender equality both as a criteria and an outcome of procurement decisions (UN Women, 2022).

 

4.1 Overview of GRP in the UN Women (Pakistan) Context

The organisation has positioned GRP as a core enabler for Pakistani women’s local capacity development, economic empowerment, and intersectional inclusion by redesigning pre-qualification processes to be more inclusive, increasing women-owned or women-led enterprises (WOBs/WLEs) in their supply chains, and addressing barriers to market access for example in finance, registration, and digital literacy.

 

4.2 Sourcing Goods and Services from Local Women-Owned SMEs as a Leverage Spend Category

The GRP model is most prominently applied in procurement of digital content, event services, catering, textiles, and supplies sourced from community-based women’s cooperatives and small enterprises in rural Balochistan, Sindh, and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provinces. Although these categories are classified as leverage or routine items under the Kraljic Matrix, UN Women (Pakistan) treats them as strategic due to their potential for socio-economic transformation in the respective communities.

 

4.3 Strategic Justification

The analysis below demonstrates how GRP confers with key CIPS models in support of inclusive procurement without compromising UN procurement principles:

 

Model / Lens	Strategic Fit
Kraljic Matrix	●     Leverage Item: Low risk, high volume ●     Used to build local gender equity
UN Supplier Diversity Framework	●     Expands procurement to underrepresented women-owned businesses
Triple Bottom Line (TBL)	●     Promotes social (women’s empowerment), environmental (local, low-emission sourcing), and economic value
UN Procurement Manual	●     When the long-term impact is considered, GRP resonates with “best value for money” (UN Women, 2023)
Risk Mitigation	●     De-risks supply chain dependence by expanding the supplier pool and strengthening local area economies

Fig. 9: Analysis models and frameworks justifying GRP sourcing.

 

Moreover, the benefits depicted in the figure below justify the adoption of GRP as a sourcing approach:

Fig. 10: Benefits of the GRP sourcing model.

 

 

4.4 Barriers and Enablers

 

The following barriers and enablers are specific to the GRP sourcing model at UN Women (Pakistan):

 

Aspect	Examples
Barriers	●     Informality ●     Limited financial literacy ●     Lack of procurement readiness ●     Patriarchal market dynamics
Enablers	●     Capacity-building workshops (e.g., via the JAZBA programme) ●     Simplified tenders ●     Pre-bid coaching clinics

Fig. 11: Barriers and enablers of the GRP sourcing approach.

 

4.5 Evaluation

GRP as present in the Country Programme Action Plan (2023–2027) is a transformative shift from gender-neutral to gender-intentional procurement for UN Women (Pakistan), linking the organisation’s procurement to national gender policy goals and the Economic Framework for Women’s Empowerment (GoP, 2021). Strategically, GRP supports horizontal equity by targeting historically excluded enterprises. Unlike WEPs-based partnerships which focus on institutional partners, GRP targets grassroots economic actors, many of whom are entering procurement systems for the first time. As a result, tendering designs and evaluation mechanisms have been adapted to reduce technical complexity and instead build in mentoring. However, GRP requires a systems-thinking approach to overcome the inherent procurement biases: for example, defining ‘value for money’ through gender lenses means prioritising impact per dollar spent, not surface cost-efficiency. To institutionalise GRP, UN Women (Pakistan) should expand its GRP Vendor Roster by province and sector, entrench gender-responsive evaluation criteria in all TORs, and launch joint GRP projects with WEPs signatories and provincial women’s chambers.

 

5.0 Direct, Ethical Sourcing

 

Direct ethical sourcing refers to a procurement method where goods or services are obtained directly from producers or accredited suppliers (thereby bypassing intermediaries) who meet rigorous ethical, social, and environmental standards (UNDG, 2023). At UN Women (Pakistan), direct, ethical sourcing is strategically used to align sourcing with the agency’s values on anti-exploitation, human rights, and sustainable development (UN Women, 2022).

 

5.1 Rationale

Direct, ethical sourcing is particularly important in the Pakistani context where informal supply chains and exploitative labour practices (such as child labour and unfair wages) persist in industries including: embroidery, handicrafts, garments, and agriculture (ILO, 2022). The zero-intermediary sourcing approach allows UN Women (Pakistan) to engage transparent, traceable, and gender values-aligned suppliers from marginalised, women-led collectives (UN Women, 2023a).

 

5.2 Spend Category: Rural Artisan Goods and Training Materials

The UN Women (Pakistan) commonly uses direct procurement to source:

• Customised IEC materials, training kits, and handmade gifts from rural women’s cooperatives
• Embroidery products, textile gifts, and baskets from micro-enterprises in South Punjab and Northern Sindh.

These are low-value, high-impact procurements that offer ethical and reputational dividends, placing them within the bottleneck quadrant of the Kraljic Matrix (albeit requiring ethical priority).

 

5.3 Strategic Fit

Direct ethical sourcing strongly supports UN Women’s mandate and SDGs, particularly SDG 5 (Gender Equality), SDG 8 (Decent Work), and SDG 12 (Responsible Consumption and Production). Below is a table evaluating direct sourcing under four other principles and models:

 

Analytical Lens	Insight
Porter’s Value Chain	●     Strengthens backward linkage to ethical production zones
TBL Framework	●     Social: Fair wages ●     Environmental: Low-emission logistics ●     Economic: Local income generation
UN Supplier Code of Conduct	●     Ensures compliance with ethical sourcing practices, including zero tolerance for child labour or gender-based discrimination
CIPS Ethical Procurement Wheel	●     Allows higher control across dimensions such as governance, labour, and environment

Fig. 12: Strategic assessment of direct, ethical sourcing at UN Women (Pakistan).

 

5.4 Risk Management and Control Mechanisms

While direct ethical sourcing enhances procurement transparency, it presents logistical and governance challenges such as:

• Limited economies of scale, thereby increasing unit cost
• Cash-flow fragility of micro-suppliers require pre-payment for goods or flexible terms of settlement
• Monitoring and verification burdens, especially in Pakistani remote districts

To mitigate these, UN Women (Pakistan) uses pre-engagement audits and periodic spot checks, ethical supplier registration with simplified compliance forms, and partnerships with CSOs for record-keeping and ethical standards training.

 

5.5 Analysis

Sourcing directly from ethical producers compliant with UN standards of fairness, gender equity, and decent work allows UN Women (Pakistan) to model integrity-driven procurement and de-risks reputational exposure from third-party misconduct. Compared to e-sourcing and GRP, direct ethical sourcing requires a deeper investment in time and relational capital. However, the impact is profound and similar to WEPs: the approaches convert every procurement transaction into a tool for justice and dignity, with the 2024 procurement of handcrafted dignity kits from a women’s cooperative in Jamshoro a case in point: besides providing essential supplies, the procurement sustained 28 households and funded local literacy classes.

To further deepen the reach of direct ethical sourcing, UN Women (Pakistan) should consider creating a Verified Ethical Supplier Platform to reduce vetting time, piloting blockchain traceability for artisan supply chains, and collaborating with ILO and UNDP on training modules for rural suppliers.

 

6.0 Supplier Appraisal Checklist

Focus Category: Locally-produced Services (Catering, Security, Gardening, Housekeeping)
Sourcing Approach: Gender-Responsive Procurement (GRP)

 

6.1 Strategic Importance of Supplier Appraisal

A structured supplier appraisal process ensures procurement decisions correspond to the UN Women (Pakistan)’s organisational mandate, specifically upholding ethical sourcing standards and advancing gender equality. In the context of locally produced services where suppliers are often informal or underdeveloped, proactive appraisal is necessary to avoid exposure to quality, compliance, or reputational risks (OECD, 2023). Notably, GRP-driven appraisals filters out vendors without a proven commitment to equity or sustainability and promotes inclusive economic participation.

 

6.2 Appraisal Criteria and Dimensions

Based on the UN procurement principles and Sustainable Procurement Frameworks (SPFs) of the UNGM (2023) report, the following six dimensions formed the foundation of this proposed supplier appraisal checklist:

 

Dimension	Key Indicators
Legal and Regulatory Compliance	●     Business registration ●     Tax compliance ●     Adherence to local labour laws
Ethical Standards	●     Commitment to UN Women Supplier Code of Conduct ●     Zero-tolerance for discrimination and forced labour
Gender Equality Performance	●     Women-owned/led status ●     Gender balance in workforce ●     Explicit policies on gender-based violence
Sustainability Practices	●     Waste reduction ●     Energy usage ●     Ethical sourcing of inputs ●     Local hiring
Service Quality & Capacity	●     Past performance ●     Ability to meet SLAs ●     Qualifications ●     Technology used
Financial Viability & Risk	●     Years of operation ●     Financial health ●     Risk of disruption ●     Insurance coverage

Fig. 13: Foundational dimensions for the proposed UN Women (Pakistan) supplier appraisal checklist.

See Also: Fig. 14 – proposed checklist with weighting; Appendix 5 for gap analysis between current and proposed appraisal standards).

 

6.3 Proposed Supplier Appraisal Checklist (Weighted)

 

Appraisal Area	Sub-Criteria	Weight (%)
Legal Compliance	●     Registration ●     Tax ●     Licences ●     Labour compliance	10%
Ethical Practices	●     Conformity to UN Code ●     No history of corruption or discrimination	15%
Gender Equality	●     Women-owned/led ●     Gender-sensitive workplace policies	25%
Sustainability	●     Environmental management ●     Local economic contribution	15%
Service Quality	●     Track record ●     Certifications ●     Capacity ●     Reliability	20%
Financial Soundness	●     Cash flow ●     Solvency ●     Continuity planning	15%
TOTAL		100%

Fig. 14: Proposed weighted supplier appraisal checklist for UN Women (Pakistan).

 

6.3.1 Weighting Rationale

The highest weight (25%) is assigned to gender equality in resonance with the UN Women’s GRP agenda and WEPs (UN Women, 2023). Service quality remains pivotal to service delivery integrity at 20%, while ethical and sustainability indicators share balanced emphasis due to the increasing scrutiny of UN supplier conduct (ILO, 2022). Though an essential consideration, legal compliance carries less weight (10%) due to the deliberate focus on informal community suppliers who, rather than disqualification, may require capacity-building support.

 

6.4 Alignment with UN and Public Sector Standards

The proposed supplier appraisal checklist aligns with the UN Secretariat Procurement Manual (UNPD, 2022), the WEPs self-assessment toolkit, and Pakistan’s Public Procurement Rules (PPRA, 2024). Furthermore, it showcases the TCO approach by recognising the 5 Rights of Procurement  (insisting on the right quality, source, and conditions) and non-price value. Additionally, the proposed checklist embodies the supplier diversity principle as promoted by the UN’s “Leave No One Behind” pledge; ensuring micro and women-owned enterprises in Pakistan are competitively appraised but not excluded.

 

6.5 Implementation and Strategic Impact

Operationalising the proposed supplier appraisal checklist requires deliberate orientation of supplier sensitisation, procurement staff, and digital tracking through UN Women’s e-procurement portal. Once institutionalised, the checklist will improve supplier selection transparency / consistency, strengthen audit-readiness (accountability), expand participation of ethical women-led suppliers, and significantly reduce procurement risks while increasing value-for-money. Notably, capacity-building workshops can support marginal suppliers to meet threshold scores in line with the UNSDG 5 and 17 obligations.

 

7.0 Conclusion

The study critically examines four sourcing approaches currently deployed by UN Women (Pakistan): E-Sourcing, WEPs-Based Partnerships, Gender-Responsive Procurement (GRP), and Direct Ethical Sourcing. Each approach reflects the organisation’s mandate to advance social value through its procurement functions, deliver tangible gender equality, and to uphold ethical integrity.

Applying models like the Kraljic Matrix, Porter’s Value Chain, CIPS Ethical Procurement Wheel, and the UN Supplier Code of Conduct, the analysis revealed that sourcing at UN Women is a lever for structural change and not transactional. In fact, the approaches discussed prove a proactive organisational design that goes beyond price efficiency to entrench inclusivity, transparency, and gender justice into procurement lifecycles (Ramirez & Lee, 2023). Each sourcing strategy serves a unique purpose: E-Sourcing enhances compliance, efficiency, and global accessibility; WEPs-Based Partnerships foster sustainable alliances that multiply impact; GRP directly addresses systemic inequities in public procurement; and Direct, Ethical Sourcing offers value-led engagement with grassroots suppliers. Together, these strategies make a holistic procurement philosophy that ensures that what UN Women (Pakistan) buys, how it buys, and from whom it buys conform with normative goals and global sourcing commitments.

 

8.0 Recommendations

Based on analytical consideration of the modern procurement scene, the initiative makes the following strategic recommendations: firstly, UN Women (Pakistan) should institutionalise an integrated sourcing policy manual. Developing a consolidated sourcing policy that formally defines the four (and other) approaches, outlines when each can best be applied, and standardises procedure across programmes or operations teams will reduce procurement inconsistency and strengthen UN Women (Pakistan)’s strategic alignment.

Secondly, the organisation should build supplier capacity in underserved regions because whereas inclusive procurement is a priority, many potential suppliers in Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa lack readiness. UN Women (Pakistan) should, therefore, partner with ILO, SMEDA, and local chambers to deliver capacity-building programmes focused on WEPs adoption, e-tendering literacy, and audit-readiness.

Additionally, UN Women (Pakistan) should implement dashboard-driven analytics that capture WEPs-aligned spend, sourcing trends, compliance ratios, and GRP achievements to allow for evidence-based decision-making and easier reporting to UN HQ or donors.

Currently, GRP is primarily applied in small-scale procurements. To amplify its impact, UN Women should upscale GRP in large, high-value, multi-year framework agreements – especially those involving consulting, logistics, and security services. A formal SRM model will also significantly improve supplier engagement, ensure post-contract support, and breed long-term collaboration in WEPs-based partnerships and direct sourcing scenarios.

Lastly, to address traceability and verification challenges in ethical sourcing, UN Women (Pakistan) could pilot blockchain-led transparency mechanisms for assorted rural suppliers. This would compound auditability and demonstrate innovative leadership to other UN agencies.

9.0 References

Amos, H. (2024). Gender Mainstreaming in Procurement: A Policy Audit of the UN System. International Journal of Gender Policy, 19(1), pp. 33–49. https://doi.org/10.2139/ijgp.2024.0002

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