Procurement Policy

The University adopted a new Procurement Policy in April 2023 that aims to strike a balance between the university’s openness and appropriate procurement practices. This new approach acknowledges the significance of supporting the university’s mission while adhering to best practices, legal requirements, risk management, and principles of transparency and fairness. The policy provides clear guidelines for procurement practices and procedures that all university members must adhere to.

The policy benefits the campus community by enhancing spend management and service delivery through established best practices. It emphasizes the use of existing internal inventories, services, and preferred supplier agreements to acquire goods and services, with the goal of promoting sustainability and efficient resource utilization.

USask allocates approximately $480 million annually for purchasing goods and services, with nearly half of this spending falling under the scope of the procurement policy. By implementing this project, the university is better equipped to manage its financial resources by leveraging economies of scale and employing competitive practices, including sourcing and overseeing campus-wide agreements.

Renewed Digital Landscape

Enterprise Procurement launched a new digital landscape on PAWS. The Procurement Services channel was developed to bring all procurement activities and information together in one, easy to navigate site. Information on the channel includes detailed processes for purchasing goods, preferred suppliers lists, training and more.

Preferred suppliers agreements

The university has entered into several new preferred supplier agreements, including several province-wide contracts with our partners in the Saskatchewan Advanced Education Collaborative (SAEC) partners—University of Regina and Saskatchewan Polytechnic—to ensure the university is getting the best value for items purchased while adhering to procurement practices for public institutions.