City of Calgary Indigenous Procurement Program

City of Calgary Indigenous Procurement Program

Setting Out (what was agreed to)

All suppliers should have equal access to public procurement opportunities. However, this has not been the case for Indigenous suppliers, who have historically faced numerous barriers when seeking procurement opportunities with the City of Calgary. In 2023, the City began its journey to co-develop a procurement program that better supports Indigenous suppliers. The first step involved engaging Indigenous Elders, community members, and business leaders to co-create a strategy aimed at making procurement processes more accessible and inclusive. The resulting Strategy outlines practical measures to increase Indigenous participation in sourcing processes and to strengthen communication and commercial relationships between the City and Indigenous communities. Throughout 2023 and 2024, Rise collaborated with the City to establish a working group—including representatives from Treaty 7 Indigenous communities—to identify gaps in the procurement process and uncover opportunities to create a more level playing field for Indigenous suppliers. Through this work, the City of Calgary demonstrated its commitment to economic Reconciliation by actively reducing barriers and building capacity in partnership with the Indigenous Working Group. These efforts were recognized by the Indigenomics Institute as a Top 10 to Watch in 2024.

Objectives

• Focus on the opportunities for new beginnings and the start of new relationships that are built on trust to build the foundation and core principle of the Procurement Program.
• Create structure within the supply chain process to ensure Indigenous voices are at the table throughout the procurement journey.
• Identify outreach, education and training needs to support the Indigenous Procurement Strategy.
• Identify relevant targets, measures and key performance indicators to support the Indigenous Procurement Strategy.
• Increase spending with Indigenous suppliers in terms of dollar value and the number of Indigenous suppliers that get awarded contracts with the City of Calgary.

The Journey Walked and Gifts Gathered

The Rise team partnered with the City of Calgary in 2023–2024 to advise on and lead engagement with Indigenous community leaders and business owners, helping shape a more inclusive procurement process and reduce barriers for Indigenous suppliers. We established and facilitated an Indigenous Working Group that met six times to identify challenges, discuss barriers, and develop a questionnaire for a broader survey assessing Indigenous suppliers’ knowledge of public procurement, their experiences, and their priorities for change.

The City of Calgary later published a “What We Heard “ report outlining how this input informed the development of its Procurement Program for Indigenous suppliers.

The Impact

Investing in the Indigenous economy has a strong positive multiplier effect on improving Calgary’s economic well-being; supporting Indigenous suppliers is an important tool to do so. The City of Calgary took the first step toward contributing to economic Reconciliation and is working intentionally to improve its operations and processes to make procurement opportunities accessible to all suppliers, including Indigenous suppliers.