Request Justification - Japan Trade Office - 2.8.2024.pdf

Request to Utilize Policy Directive for Trade Offices – ISDA and IDOC

Justification

ISDA intends to establish a trade office in Japan ahead of the Governor’s Trade Mission to Japan in November 2024. The Japan Trade Office initiative is working through the legislative process at the present time, and ISDA would like to be ready once the legislature authorizes the new trade office.

Maintaining a successful Trade Office requires extensive knowledge of Idaho and significant networking and contacts. Selecting and onboarding a new Contractor requires substantial time, resources, and funds. ISDA has had experience establishing trade office partnerships in Mexico and East Asia (Taiwan) and understands the time commitment required to put the pieces in place.

Being authorized in advance to utilize the Policy Directive for Trade Offices will help ISDA meet the timeline for the November 2024 Governor’s Trade Mission.

ISDA would like to utilize the current Policy Directive for Trade Offices under which our Mexico and East Asia trade offices are presently operating to establish the new trade office partnership with a contractor in Japan. We would adhere to the requirements laid out in the policy directive.

The Trade Office partner would be selected through a modified RFP process, similar to the one through which the Mexico contractor was selected in 2016. Once the contractor is selected, ISDA would expect the contract to remain in place for many years, or until one or both parties became dissatisfied with the arrangement. In this way, the Japan trade office would mirror the Mexico and East Asia trade offices.

The modified RFP process that ISDA plans to use differs from a standard, DOP-led RFP in these ways:

1) DOP will have a supervisory role over the modified RFP process, while the Agency will be the procurement lead for the modified RFP.

2) The outcome will be a renewable legal agreement rather than a Contract PO or Blanket PO.

3) The resulting legal agreement will be renewable for as long as the contractor performance is satisfactory, which may exceed the typical five-year Resolicitation timeline.

4) Some Agency personnel will hold multiple roles in the RFP process due to their knowledge, language abilities, and experience. For example, the Agriculture Bureau Chief for Marketing will be instrumental in writing the Scope of Work for the RFP and in evaluating the potential contractors. Her insight will be critically important both in the development of the Scope of Work and the evaluation process.

5) A team of Agency evaluators would travel to Japan to conduct in-country interviews with the top two or three bidders, rather than the bidders traveling to the US for oral presentations or demonstrations.

If you have further questions, please contact Molly Heiss, Purchasing Agent at ISDA at 208-332- 8641 or molly.heiss@isda.idaho.gov