Choosing a logistics partner for work inside Afghanistan comes down to three decisions taken in order. First, what you are actually buying: execution inside the country, international freight and customs clearance, or both. Second, whether one partner should hold the whole assignment or several specialists should each hold a part. Third, which candidate can show, with evidence you can check, that it will do the work in your provinces, keep the records you need and handle problems the way you need them handled. This guide sets out the questions for each, the evidence that answers them, and a worksheet to compare candidates side by side.
It applies whoever the candidates are, Zhikal included. The supplier due diligence checklist covers the formal checks before award, and the logistics RFQ checklist covers the request itself.
Decide which scope you are buying
Logistics for an assignment in Afghanistan often has two halves that are different businesses:
| Part of the job | What it covers | Who usually provides it |
|---|---|---|
| International freight and customs clearance | What it coversMoving goods into the country by road, air or sea, and clearing them | Who usually provides itFreight forwarders and customs brokers |
| Execution inside Afghanistan | What it coversLocal sourcing, storage, road transport between provinces, kitting, distribution, field support, records | Who usually provides itDomestic logistics and supply companies |
Many assignments need both. If yours does, name the point where one hands over to the other, such as the release of cleared goods at a named place, and say who holds the goods and the risk on each side of it. If you buy everything locally, you may need only the second half. A candidate strong in one half is not necessarily strong in the other; ask each what it does itself.
One capability, or integrated delivery
| One partner for the whole assignment | Several specialists |
|---|---|
| One contract, one escalation line, one set of records | Several specialistsCompetition within each part, which can lower some prices |
| Fewer handovers between companies, so fewer gaps at audit | Several specialistsDeeper specialism where a part is technical |
| One reconciliation from purchase to delivery | Several specialistsLess dependence on a single company |
| More depends on that one partner's performance | Several specialistsMore interfaces for your team to coordinate and reconcile |
Neither is right in general. Integrated delivery tends to suit multi-province assignments where most of the risk sits in the handovers between purchase, storage, transport and distribution. Separate contracts tend to suit work where one part is specialised or where your organisation wants to keep competition alive in each part. If you split, write down who owns each handover, and how the records from different suppliers will be reconciled.
Test the geography, province by province
"We cover all provinces" is a claim to test, not a fact to accept. For each province and district you need, ask:
- Who is there? A permanent office, a regional coordinator, a partner or subcontractor, or a team that will be deployed when the work starts. Each can work; you need to know which you are buying.
- Who has worked there? A recent assignment in the same area, with a referee you can call.
- How does a team reach district level? By what road, in what vehicle, and with what local arrangements.
- What happens in winter? The Logistics Cluster's road network assessment (opens in a new tab) records roads that lose access in winter or take only light trucks; ask how the candidate plans for those destinations.
- How fast will you hear about a problem? Who reports a lost route or a delayed delivery, to whom, and within how long.
Ask for a short mobilisation plan for your own locations. A credible plan names people and places; a weak one restates the company profile.
Experience you can check
Ask for references for work like yours, in scope, scale and geography, with names and telephone numbers, and call them. Ask for completion certificates or reference letters. Ask for samples of the records the candidate produced on past work, with personal data removed: a waybill, a goods received note, a distribution report, a closeout report. And ask how a past problem was handled: a shortfall at a site, a road that closed, a supplier that failed. How a company describes its exceptions tells you more than how it describes its successes.
Who holds the supply chain
Ask what the candidate owns, what it contracts, and what it subcontracts: vehicles, warehouses, staff in the field, suppliers of goods. Contracted and subcontracted capacity is normal in the Afghan market, but you should know who will turn up, who answers for their performance and conduct, and who bears the loss if goods are damaged or lost in their hands. The Logistics Cluster's transport assessment (opens in a new tab) records that insurance services were suspended in March 2022; ask for the current position in writing rather than assuming cover.
Controls you can audit
Ask each candidate to show, not describe, the controls behind its work: who approves a purchase and who pays for it (they should be different people), how goods are inspected and recorded at receipt and dispatch, what is signed at each handover, how quantities are reconciled from purchase to delivery, how costs are reconciled against delivery evidence, and whether reports come in your templates. Ask how a problem is escalated, to whom, and how fast.
Make the quotations comparable
Send every candidate the same request with the same quantities, locations, dates and records, and ask for prices on one basis with exclusions and assumptions listed. Bring the quotations to the same basis before comparing totals, and state the non-price criteria and their weights in advance. Clarify in writing only. Answer a question about the request to every candidate, without saying who asked; put a question about one candidate's offer to that candidate alone, and let the answer change neither the substance nor the price of the offer. Both rules are in the UN's Procurement Practitioner's Handbook (opens in a new tab).
Questions to ask every candidate
- Which parts of this assignment will you do with your own staff, and which through partners or subcontractors?
- For each province we named, who is there, and what is their arrangement with you?
- Which recent assignments are most like ours, and who can we call about them?
- May we see a sample of the records you produced on one of them?
- Who will lead our assignment, and to whom do they escalate?
- How will you tell us when access to a site is lost or a delivery will be late, and within how long?
- Who bears loss of or damage to goods in your custody, and what is your insurance position?
- What does your price exclude, and what does it assume?
- Which controls separate the person who buys from the person who approves and the person who pays?
- Which of our reporting templates can you use as they are?
Warning signs
- Coverage claimed for every province, with nobody named in any of them.
- References that cannot be called, or a list of client logos offered instead.
- Delivery dates guaranteed whatever the season or the road.
- A price without exclusions, or one much lower than the others with no explanation of what it leaves out.
- No sample of the records you will receive.
- Reluctance to put responsibilities, liability or reporting times in writing.
- A supplier registration, such as a UNGM number, presented as an approval or endorsement by the United Nations. It is neither.
- Certificates or accreditations that the issuing body cannot confirm.
The comparison worksheet
Score each candidate on the same criteria, with the weights set before you read the offers. Record the evidence behind each score, so the comparison can be explained later.
Logistics partner comparison worksheet
Weights are set before the offers are opened. Score each criterion 0 to 5 and note the evidence seen.
The assignment
Assignment and reference
ScopeInside Afghanistan, international freight and customs, or both; the handover point
Provinces and districts
Evaluated byNames and roles
Scores
| Criterion | Weight % | Candidate A: score and evidence | Candidate B: score and evidence | Candidate C: score and evidence |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Does the scope we need, with its own staff where it matters | ||||
| Presence in our provinces, by arrangement and named people | ||||
| Similar work, with references we called | ||||
| Records: samples seen, our templates accepted | ||||
| Controls: separation of duties, inspection, reconciliation | ||||
| Handling of access problems, delays and shortfalls | ||||
| Liability and insurance position, in writing | ||||
| Price on one basis, with exclusions added back | ||||
| Weighted total |
Before deciding
- Due diligence completed for the preferred candidate
Clarifications in writing: answers about the request sent to every candidate, and no offer's substance or price changed
- Recommendation and approval recorded in one note
Where Zhikal fits
Zhikal is an Afghan-owned company working inside Afghanistan: sourcing and procurement, storage, road transport, distribution and field support, alone or as one project logistics assignment led by one named project lead. International freight forwarding and customs clearance are not among the services it offers. Its coverage page shows which of its five coordination zones covers each province and where that zone is coordinated from, its Experience page lists its projects, case studies and registration identifiers with a route to ask for references, and the page for international programmes and contractors sets out how it works as a local execution partner.
Put the questions above to Zhikal as you would to any candidate. To start, send your scope and locations to the team in Kabul.
Sources
- UN Procurement Practitioner's Handbook (2006) (opens in a new tab)
Inter-Agency Procurement Working Group, published by the Logistics Cluster. Long-term agreements, supplier eligibility and post-qualification, clarifications during solicitation and evaluation, and due diligence.
- 2.3 Afghanistan Road Network (opens in a new tab)
Logistics Cluster, Logistics Capacity Assessment. Road conditions by region, including roads that lose access in winter or take only light trucks.
- 3.2 Afghanistan Transporters (opens in a new tab)
Logistics Cluster, Logistics Capacity Assessment. How the domestic trucking market, transport slips and tariffs work, and the 2022 suspension of insurance services.
External sources are cited for the facts they report and were checked when this guide was last updated. Citing them implies no relationship with, or endorsement by, their publishers.