This 19th Edition of the NIGP 5-Digit Class-Item Code identifies products and services by Class and Item and includes revisions and additions resulting from commodity coding services applied to the NIGP Code since the issuance of the 18th Edition. While this edition reflects hundreds of changes to the Code over the past year, there is a significant major revision worth noting here:
Over the course of the past few months, the NIGP Code team has assembled a working group to study the need for and implementation of NIGP Codes for environmentally certified products/services (“green products”). The need for “green” commodity codes arose from the need (and sometimes, mandate) to track vendors and spend data for green or environmentally friendly certified products and services. The workgroup has been engaged for the past 6 months working on an approach that meets the needs of the procurement community in terms of:
- Flexibility – the need for the new commodity codes to utilized in various scenarios;
- Specificity – the need to identify the products and services at the appropriate level;
- Interoperability – the need for the solution to be utilized in the various information systems, and;
- Scalability – the need for the solution to support future growth.
The options reviewed included:
- Creation of “green” codes at the 7 digit NIGP Code level. This would allow for the use of the existing class/item structures and capture the environmentally certified component more as an attribute. Unfortunately, the vast majority of users utilize the 5 digit NIGP Code, which would prohibit many from implementing it.
- Creation of XML-based “green” attribute tags. This would allow for the use of the existing NIGP Codes as is, however few systems support this, and looking at the commodity code and base description, there would be no differentiation between regular and green-certified products.
- Creation of a Code suffix, e.g., 485-06-G, to denote green certified products. However, for systems that use a numeric commodity code numbering schema, the introduction of an alpha character would not be supported without modifications to the systems.
- Creation of classes, class-items to make green certified classes and class-items to reflect certified products and services.
This last approach satisfied all four criteria based on the discussions of the working group. It utilizes the existing structures and will not require changes to systems in order to support. Reporting will be facilitated by providing a clear delineation of green versus non-green products and services. For example, for the class 485 (Janitorial supplies), a new class 486 was created, “Janitorial supplies, environmentally certified by an agency recognized certification entity.”
Five digit codes beneath that class would reflect the same structure as the original, non-certified products and services. It will be up to the using agency to define what standards are acceptable and what certification entities are recognized by the agency, as certification standards, entities and processes are a most often evaluated locally.
For users of the NIGP Code, additional columns have been added to the data file available for download:
- A new flag to denote the class, class-item is environmentally certified
- A cross reference field to point a green commodity back to its non-green original code
New classes include: 436, 486, 631
The 19th Edition Class Item Book and the NIGP Class Item Alphabetical Index Book are now available for purchase as long as you have a current License Agreement with us. You can order these books online under “Order Now”.
Thank you for your business and continued support of the NIGP Commodity/Services Code. If you have any questions about the changes listed above, please call 1-800-757-6064 or email info@nigp.com for assistance.