Assistant Director (Procurement)

This opportunity is offered by Pakistan Single Window (PSW) on behalf of the National Agri-Trade and Food Safety Authority (NAFSA). NAFSA is a strategic national initiative aimed at strengthening Pakistan’s agri-trade ecosystem by enhancing regulatory oversight, facilitating trade, and modernizing food safety and trade processes. The selected candidate will join NAFSA’s foundational team and play a key role in developing systems, processes, and institutional capabilities to support this mission.

Key Responsibilities

The candidate will support the entire procurement lifecycle, including annual procurement planning, requisition validation, solicitation, bid/quote receipt, evaluation coordination, award processing, and contracting. All activities must comply with applicable procurement rules, delegated authorities, and NAFSA’s standard operating procedures.

Preparation and maintenance of procurement plans and trackers will be essential. This includes managing timelines, sourcing approaches such as RFQs, RFPs, or competitive bidding, estimating costs, and ensuring alignment with approved budgets and user department requirements.

The role involves drafting and processing procurement documentation, including bidding documents, RFQs/RFPs, terms of reference/specifications templates, bid opening records, comparative statements, evaluation reports, and award recommendation notes for approval.

Ensuring transparency, timeliness, and thorough documentation of procurement activities is critical. This includes maintaining complete audit trails covering approvals, communications, bids/quotations, evaluation sheets, minutes, and conflict-of-interest declarations where applicable.

Coordination with user departments to finalize technical specifications, statements of work, evaluation criteria, delivery timelines, and acceptance requirements is required. The candidate must ensure that clarifications are properly documented and consistently communicated to bidders.

Supporting contract administration and vendor onboarding is part of the role. This includes issuing purchase orders and contracts, coordinating delivery and installation, managing inspection and acceptance documentation, and handling handover and close-out records.

Maintaining procurement records and vendor files is necessary, including tracking performance history, compliance documents, and any dispute or penalty records. The candidate will also assist in monitoring vendor performance against contractual deliverables and service level agreements.

The role requires supporting procurement reporting and analytics, such as cycle times, savings or value-for-money indicators, pending procurements, contract status, and compliance reporting for management review and audit purposes.

Finally, the candidate will coordinate the resolution of procurement-related issues like delays, non-compliance, or quality concerns through documented correspondence and escalate matters to the relevant authorities as needed.

Required Qualifications

A minimum of a Bachelor’s degree (16 years of education) in Business Administration, Supply Chain, Finance, Engineering, or a related discipline is required.

Candidates must have at least four years of overall professional experience, with a minimum of four years specifically in procurement. Experience in public sector procurement is preferred.

Strong knowledge of procurement rules, tendering processes, and contract documentation is essential. The candidate should demonstrate excellent documentation skills, coordination abilities, and a high level of integrity.

Preferred Qualifications and Benefits

While not explicitly stated, preference will be given to candidates with public sector procurement experience, reflecting familiarity with government regulations and procedures.

This role offers the unique opportunity to contribute to a foundational national initiative, working within a dynamic environment focused on modernizing Pakistan’s agri-trade and food safety landscape.

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This description provides a comprehensive overview of the position, its responsibilities, and the qualifications required to succeed in this critical role within NAFSA’s team.