Suppliers’ Involvement and Emergency Response in Humanitarian Organizations in Nairobi

Abstract

Supplier involvement is key in the achievement of the required levels of supply chain performance in a firm.The research purpose was establishing what influence supplier involvement in emergency response in humanitarian firms in Nairobi. The research objectives were; to establish the extent to which supplier involvement has been implemented by Humanitarian firms in Nairobi and to ascertain impact of supplier involvement on emergency response performance of Humanitarian firms in Nairobi. Descriptive research design was adopted and questionnaires used as research tool. The primary tool for collecting data was a questionnaire, which was administered through email method. The data was analysed using descriptive statistics, regression and correlation analysis. The study findings indicate that on a moderate extent, supplier involvement have been implemented by Humanitarian organizations in Nairobi through product development, collaborations and partnerships, information sharing and use of modern technology. These findings show that a positive relationship exists between the supplier involvement and emergency response represented by fifty two percent in terms of the R-squared value. Further studies need to focus on the challenges facing the implementation of supplier involvement and the ways that those challenges can be solved. The researchers therefore recommend trainings on supplier involvement and their roles, government support in resource mobilization, collaborations with relevant stakeholders among others. The limitation of the study is that it focused only on humanitarian firms in Nairobi, therefore, the results might not be applicable for other sectors other than the humanitarian firms in Nairobi. More research can be undertaken on the variables that were not included in this study. Key words: Supplier involvement, Emergency response, Humanitarian firms in Nairobi.