U.S.A: Foreign Sourcing in Government Procurement

24 June 19: Governments around the world spend trillions of dollars to purchase goods and services—and some of those purchases are made from foreign firms. The U.S. and key trade partners have signed pacts like the WTO Agreement on Government Procurement and NAFTA to open their government purchasing to international competition. Among governments we reviewed, 2–19% of their procurement was from foreign sources.In 2015, the U.S. likely procured over twice as much from key trade partners as those countries did from U.S. firms—an estimated $5 billion vs. $2 billion in contracts. Canada and Mexico awarded most of the foreign contracts that U.S. firms won.