ABSTRACT
The ultimate goal of risk management is to protect and enhance what the enterprise is primarily there to do. In the private sector the aim is profitable survival. Procurement Risk exists for an organisation 'when supply market behaviour, and the organisation's dealings with suppliers, create outcomes which harm company reputation, capability, operational integrity and financial viability'. Interestingly at least half of the risks in the Top Ten can be directly related to procurement activity, and hence would fall within the remit of Procurement Risk Management (PRM). One consequence of this is that procurement risk has emerged as a comprehensive topic in its own right rather than being a facet of specific but fragmented procurement tasks. Many definitions of risk management exist but are often too vague to be useful, such as 'risk is the probability of incurring loss or misfortune'.
