What business opportunities are available?

The United Nations is committed to building agile, responsive and accountable end-to-end solutions for our global partners.

To support approximately 75,000 personnel in UN Peacekeeping Missions, the UN is seeking companies to supply, store, manage, and deliver food rations and bottled water, and provide other services and equipment to UN troops at their deployed locations. The approximate UN annual spend for Food Rations is $300 million.

The UN does not buy food directly from food manufacturers / suppliers. Instead, the UN contracts companies to provide turnkey services (the Contractor) including:

• sourcing approximately 500 different high-quality food items;
• warehousing;
• delivering rations to the end users;
• implementing opportunities for circular economy;

The Contractor must ensure that the procured food meets the UN Rations Standards related to food quality and safety aspects.

• UN Food Rations Standards (Contracts entered into before August 2016)
  
• UN Food Rations Standards (August 2016 Revision - for contracts entered into from Aug 2018 to Feb 2019 only)
• UN Food Rations Standards (August 2018 Revision – for contracts entered into after March 2019 only)

In some cases, Contractors are requested to rent or even build their own warehouses. They may also need to manage different food warehouses in the country where the mission is located.

Food reserves must be stored and rotated in the warehouses. And, on a weekly or bi-weekly basis, food orders must be transported to the contingents' locations. The Contractor is also responsible for managing outbound operation from the warehouses to the final food delivery points. The Contractor has the discretion to subcontract this task to local transport companies or use their own trucks.

Catering services to the mission’s personnel, mostly civilians, is an optional but desirable requirement.  In some cases it may be provided within the same rations contract.

Qualified suppliers should have expertise in complex logistics and demonstrate experience in deploying operations outside their home country, including in challenging environments impacted by security and/or climatic conditions.

All rations contract operations must be supported by a suitable enterprise resource planning software that shall be integrated with the UN Electronic Rations Management System.

The performance of our contractors is monitored on a consumption period basis (28 days) using pre-defined key performance indicators, including delivery time, final delivery completeness, number of food substitutions, quality and level of the reserve and operational stocks, and warehouse operations.

Who can apply?

If your company has expertise in complex logistics, has experience in deploying operations internationally, and holds a Food Safety Management Certification for quality assurance, we want to hear from you.

Join us in our efforts and be part of a critical mission to support peacekeeping operations worldwide.

A few steps to note:

1. Register in the UNGM Welcome to the United Nations Global Marketplace (UNGM) - mandatory
2. Respond to Requests for Expressions of Interest in the United Nations Procurement Division website and select Commodity Group: Rations
3. When you receive an Ariba eTendering invitation respond to the solicitation via Ariba platform;
4. Attend the mandatory bidders’ conference – mandatory to be eligible to participate in solicitation exercises.

You can always contact us for more information

Looking forward to working with you!

The UN will conduct a rations business seminar both in-person and on-line on 7 March 2024 for companies interested in providing end-to end turn-key food rations services to the United Nations peace-keeping operations. Companies interested in attending may register before 29 February 2024 by clicking the following link: https://forms.office.com/e/G0HRHR4JrU and emailing UNPD (Marie-Chantal Maille e-mail maille@un.org) documentary proof of the company’s previous experience in managing and/or delivering food somewhere in the world, such as a valid food safety management certificate; or copy of audited financial statements where the activity of managing or delivering food is explicitly mentioned; or copy of an agreement with a sub-supplier that has proven experience delivering food, alongside the corresponding proof for the sub-supplier including full registered business name and UNGM number.