Mogadishu – The United Nations Support Office in Somalia (UNSOS) has capacitated fuel vendors on bidding for contracts to supply petroleum products to the UN logistical support body in Somalia.

UNSOS Life Support Services Section recently held a business seminar for 23 local and international fuel vendors, facilitated by officials from the Procurement Division in the UN Department of Operational Support.

The training covered essential areas for securing UN contracts, including fuel supply requirements, registration on the UN Global Marketplace online portal, procurement procedures and bidding processes.

Babacar Diop, UNSOS Chief of Life Support Section, stressed the importance of fuel as a critical commodity for UN operations in Somalia. 

“Fuel is one of the biggest commodities in UNSOS, and the objective of this engagement was to explain to the fuel vendors operating in Somalia our requirements; what UNSOS needs in terms of petroleum, oil and lubricants and listen to them in terms of their challenges,” said Diop who oversees fuel and rations at the UN body.

The seminar was part of UNSOS’ ongoing engagements with Somali-owned businesses, following previous engagements for food vendors and women-owned businesses. 

UNSOS Director, Qurat Ul-Ain Sadozai, stressed that empowering local businesses through capacity-building initiatives is crucial for boosting their competitiveness in securing UN contracts. She highlighted the significant growth in UNSOS contracts awarded to local Somali-owned businesses, skyrocketing from $1 million to approximately $90 million in recent years.

“For many years, we've been trying to engage more so that we can increase the competitiveness of local vendors in processes of bidding and solicitation. Now, we see that capacity increasing. This is purely because it's a partnership where we are engaging much more to understand what is required by the country, by the Somali vendors, what works, what doesn't work,” said Qurat. 

Dahir Maow Issack, the Finance Manager of Hass Petroleum, noted the huge impact of the partnership between UNSOS and Somali-owned enterprises. 

“It has helped us to employ many Somalis, improved our profitability and boosted our capacity in terms of the local people who are benefiting,” said Dahir. 

Abdikadir Abdi Ali, the Chief Operations Officer of Dayah Energy and Services Limited, a bulk fuel supplier to UNSOS, said the seminar provided an opportunity to engage in productive dialogue and address outstanding concerns. 

“We’ve had some challenging days, and we've had good days too. But overall, it’s good working with the UN and being able to provide them our services. We hope we can grow with them in the future and provide more of our services to them,” said Abdikadir.  

UNSOS Procurement Officer, Dominique Kouassi Ekon, said the vendors were guided on how to prepare and submit competitive bids. 

“Fuel is a very volatile product with sudden prices changes, so we trained them on how to build the price, considering all interlinked parameters. It is not like the open market where they can change price every day, so they need to build in their price every element and considering that variation will happen during the contract period,” said Kouassi. 

UNSOS provides non-lethal logistical support, including fuel supplies, to the African Union Transition Mission (ATMIS), the United Nations Assistance Mission in Somalia (UNSOM) and the Somali Security Forces (SSF).