Increase Availability of Priority Products — Priority metric card

Description and purpose

This measure will help organizations to understand whether the donated products align with and help fulfill priority product demands. It helps show the gap between what has been identified as a priority and what ultimately becomes available through donated supply for use.

Why this matters

Shows how responsive the donation system is to local health partner priorities and helps build stronger partnerships and more consistent pipelines of priority products. This metric helps organizations see where donated supply is meeting identified demand, where gaps remain. This understanding drives deeper understanding of trends in priorities, as well as where sourcing, donor engagement, planning, or partnership decisions may need to change.

What this helps different actors understand

Corporate donors

a broader overall picture of partner priorities as well as the scale of those needs and if available donated supply aligns with prioritized product demand.

NGOs

patterns across partners can inform sourcing, donor outreach, allocation, and future procurement strategy

Local/in-country partners

how much priority product demand exists that is being/not being met over the reporting period , as well as understand potential availability by procurement/partner type . Assists in communications related to planning and care.

Key questions

What patterns exist around identified priority product demand and delivery?
What are the most prominent and consistent gaps in a given year, and year-over-year?
How effective is the current donation system in meeting need, and what are the access and availability drivers of specific needed products?
How does the match between identified demand and received supply change over time?

Recommended for

Produce-to-Give
Recurring Excess Product Donations

Typical data sources

Partner priority-product demand records, requests, assessments, surveys or structured partner reporting
Donation shipping, acceptance and receipt records
Initial partnership documentation
Distribution or delivery records confirming receipt by the local partner

Calculation guidance

Fix the reporting period and the product types..
Identify priority product demand for the reporting period. Calculate by product type unless a finer level is needed and feasible.
Identify the quantity of donated supply for the same product type that was acually received by the local/in-country partner during the same reporting period.
Do not count supply as available for this metric until it has been received by the local/in-country partner.
Calculate: received donated supply / identified priority product demand x 100.
Report the result by product type, per reporting period.
Repeat for each product type by partner.
Examine % match over different product types, if applicable.
Consider if there is an acceptable goal or % threshold.
Analyze results over reporting periods and across years.
Keep product types and reporting periods consistent across cycles.

Additional metric information

Unit of measure

Percentage (%). Underlying quantities must use the same standardized unit or a defined count (items, kits, packages) for numerator and denominator.

Numerator

Quantity of the relevant priority product type received by the local partner during the reporting period, in a standardized unit.

Denominator

Assessed demand for the same priority product type, reporting unity, and period.

Direction

A higher percentage indicates that more identified demand was met. Interpret values in context; donation programs may not have access to all needed products and also % match should not exceed 100%

Reporting frequency

A reporting period fixed in advance; often quarterly or annual, but another consistent period may be appropriate. Hold constant for year-over year analysis.

Useful disaggregation

Product type; product class/product where useful; local/in-country partner; geography; reporting period.

Assumptions

Identified priority product demand should be grounded as close to the community/local level as feasible and developed in coordination with the relevant local/in-country partner.
Priority product types are linked to partner- and program-specific strategies.
Results are most useful when tracked consistently over time.
For medicine/pharmaceutical donations, programs may need to account for clinically appropriate substitution where products within the same class can meet the same treatment need.
Some produce-to-give programs may achieve 100% match by design.
The reporting period may be annual, another fixed period, or shipment-based, provided the same period is used for numerator and denominator.

Interpretation and limitations

This metric measures alignment between identified demand and received donated supply; it does not measure total population need or imply that donated products should meet all need.
Identified demand should be grounded in
in-country partner context and should not be defined by what a donor has available.
Programs may find it useful for the result to inform donation supply gaps.
Substitution may be appropriate within a product class in some programs and should be documented where it affects interpretation.
Use contribution language. Multiple actors, procurement systems, public supply, and other sources may influence overall product availability.

Decisions this evidence can inform

What is the broad demand for product types.
Which procurement or partnership opportunities may be needed and when
How to prioritize available donated supply across partners or geographies
Some recurring donation programs may achieve 100% match by design
Where donation supply is not an appropriate or sufficient response and other access strategies are needed
Stories and qualitative data will add context to the analysis efforts

What this evidence helps you show

How closely donated supply aligns with identified priority product demand, where gaps remain, and how the partners can respond strategically to those gaps.

Percent of priority product demand met through available supply