The federal government has exceeded its small business contracting goal of 23 percent in fiscal year 2016 by awarding 24.34 percent or $99.96 billion of total contract funds to small businesses.The Small Business Administration said Thursday federal contract dollars awarded to small businesses in 2016 increased by more than $9 billion from the previous year.
Federal agencies also met contracting targets for small disadvantaged, service-disabled/veteran-owned and women-owned small businesses — which are set at 5 percent, 3 percent and 5 percent, respectively.
The federal government awarded 9.52 percent of contract funds to small disadvantaged businesses; 3.98 percent to service-disabled/veteran-owned companies; and 4.79 percent to women-owned businesses.
SBA uses the Small Business Procurement Scorecard to assess federal agencies’ efforts to achieve their small business prime contracting and subcontracting goals annually.
Federal agencies work with SBA every year to determine their own contracting goals and SBA must make sure that the sum total of all agency goals exceeds the 23 percent target established by law.
SBA gave the federal government an overall grade of “A” using the scorecard, while seven agencies received A+, 11 received an A, four received a B and one agency was given a C.
The federal government failed to meet the 3 percent goal for small businesses in historically-underutilized business zones, awarding only 1.67 percent of total contracts.
