Federal Government Says It Exceeded Its Small Business Federal Contracting Goal

The U.S. Small Business Administration announced in August that the federal government exceeded its small business federal contracting goal, awarding 26.50 percent or $132.9 billion in federal contract dollars to small businesses, over $12 billion increase from the previous fiscal year.  Additionally, the Fiscal Year 2019 Small Business Federal Procurement Scorecard marks the second time in Scorecard history that the women-owned small business contracting goal of 5% has been met*.

The federal government also added a record-breaking one million jobs to the American economy with $132.9 billion in prime contract dollars awarded to small businesses and $90.7 billion in subcontracts awarded.  Overall, the federal government earned an “A” on this year’s government-wide Scorecard.

“I’m thrilled to report that the federal government exceeded its set goals and awarded a significant $132 billion to small businesses in FY19,” said SBA Administrator Jovita Carranza.  “There is good news for women-owned small businesses too.  For the second time in the history of the Scorecard, the federal government has met the women’s contracting goal. For the seventh year in a row, the federal government has also exceeded the contracting goal set for service-disabled veterans.  The federal prime and subcontracts awarded to small businesses in FY19 equate to more than one million jobs created.  Every contract that gets in the hands of a small business is a win-win for our nation, entrepreneurs and their employees, and the communities they support. This is especially important now, as our economy recovers from the pandemic-related setbacks.”

FY2019 Small Business Federal Procurement Scorecard:

The individual agency scorecards released today by the SBA, as well as a detailed explanation of the methodology, is available online.

• In FY19, the federal government exceeded the service-disabled veteran-owned small business and small disadvantaged business goals and the prime contract dollar awards in all small business categories increased from previous years.
• The federal government also exceeded its subcontract goals for awards to small businesses and women-owned small businesses and awarded more than $90 billion in subcontracts to all small businesses.

*The prime contract goal achievements by dollars and percentages for all categories are as follows:

1. FY19, in accordance with federal law, SBA  provided double credit, for scorecard purposes only, for prime contract awards in disaster areas that are awarded as a local area set aside and a small business or other socio-economic set aside when the vendor state is the same as the place of performance (15 USC § 644(f)), for Puerto Rico awards  (15 USC § 644(x)(1)) and included in the calculation of FY19 government-wide achievements the Department of Energy first-tier subcontracts required to be included by section 318 of the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2014 (“CAA”), Public Law 113-76.

SBA continues to collaborate with federal agencies to expand small business opportunities for small business contractors to compete and win federal contracts. The FY2019 Scorecard analyzed the prime contracting and subcontracting performance and other contributing factors, which resulted in an overall “A” grade for the federal government. Eight agencies received A+, 14 received a grade of “A” and two received a “B” grade.

Small Business Federal Procurement Scorecard Overview:

The annual Procurement Scorecard is an assessment tool to: (1) measure how well federal agencies reach their small business and socio-economic prime contracting and subcontracting goals; (2) provide accurate and transparent contracting data and (3) report agency-specific progress.  The prime and subcontracting component goals include goals for small businesses, small businesses owned by women, small disadvantaged businesses, service-disabled veteran-owned small businesses, and small businesses located in Historically Underutilized Business Zones (HUBZones).

Every year, the SBA works with each agency to set their prime and subcontracting goals and their performance is based on the agreed upon goals.  Each federal agency has a different small business contracting goal, determined annually in consultation with the SBA.  The SBA ensures that the sum total of all of the goals exceeds the 23 percent target for the federal government as well as the socio-economic goals established by law.

While each federal agency is responsible for ensuring the quality of its own contracting data, SBA conducts additional analyses to help agencies identify potential data anomalies.  As part of its ongoing data quality efforts, the SBA works with federal agency procurement staff to provide analysis and tools to facilitate review of data, implement improvements to procurement systems and conduct training to improve accuracy.