The Prime Vendor Pilot was conducted as part of U.S. Department of Agriculture's Business Process Re-engineering efforts to improve the administration and operation of the Food Distribution Program on Indian Reservations (FDPIR).
Under this pilot, USDA partnered with the Department of Defense, which had an existing contract with commercial vendors and distributors. Reinhart Foods was selected as the prime vendor and was responsible for accepting food orders directly from 23 Indian Tribal Organizations (ITOs) in the Midwest Region, procuring pre-approved food products, storing and delivering the foods to the ITOs.
The evaluation compared results from the first year of the prime vendor pilot (July 2001 - June 2002) with the traditional FDPIR commodity distribution system that operated in the previous year (July 2000 - June 2001)