What is a Category A commodity?
- Goods or services that are standard or of a similar nature across the largely common requirements of users in the public sector in Scotland.
- Where a single contracting interface facilitates the efficiency and competitiveness of suppliers.
- Where the utilisation of contracts established by a single central organisation would offer improved cost through consolidated procurement volumes & value, and would offer optimised use of scarce procurement resources & skills and concentrate market intelligence information.
Agreement on in-scope Category A commodities
The Contracts and Strategy Directory provides details of the commodities currently available or in development. There are ongoing discussions with the sectoral Centres of Expertise to review a range of further commodity goods & services to assess if they can be designated as national contracts.
Practical tests to determine in-scope Category A's
This analysis was carried out collaboratively between the procurement Centres of Expertise.
| Criteria | Test | Caveat |
|---|
| Standard or of a similar nature | Products can be categorised - using historical spend data tool | Initial test likely to be supply / market side view rather than product, until MI depth develops. |
| Across largely common requirements | Spend profile - using historical spend data tool | Broadly consistent with sectoral spend contributions No sector > 80% |
| Improved cost through consolidated procurement volumes and value | Price elasticity of demand -Market Analysis & Experience | Market analysis / previous experience indicates opportunity to leverage spend. |
| Optimised use of scarce procurement resources and skills | Plans in place across sectors to address common spend - Shared Business Plans | Resources in place to address business driven opportunities. |
| Single contracting point provides an advantage. | Supplier concentration - using Market Analysis and historical spend data tool | Depending on other market dynamics, high or low concentration may indicate positive opportunity for national collaboration |