Clauses · FAR · Supply chain and sourcing
FAR 52.225-23 Required Use of American Iron, Steel, and Manufactured Goods-Buy American Statute-Construction Materials under Trade Agreements
Does the regulation require it to flow down?
No
The clause has four paragraphs — (a) Definitions, (b) Construction materials, (c) Request for determination of inapplicability, (d) Data — and NO subcontracts paragraph; verified against the full text on 2026-08-05. Primes flow it down for the same reason as 52.225-21: the material origin duty can only be discharged through suppliers, and construction flow-down schedules are maintained as omnibus lists. RTX's November 2024 revision imposes it in the same block as 52.225-21, headed for construction orders
A clause can reach your subcontract without a mandate. Once it is in your document, it is a contract term all the same. The missing mandate is a fact about the regulation. It is not a ruling on your order.
Checked against acquisition.gov on 2026-08-05 · edition Nov 2023 (Basic; Alt I Nov 2023) · base v0.9.3 Read the text ↗
What it makes you produce
2 items for your checklist, slowest first.
Something somebody else has to issue you
The same day if the issuer is one of your own suppliers, months if it is an assessor or an underwriter.
Origin evidence for the construction material from whoever made it — for manufactured material, where it was manufactured; for iron or steel, where it was produced
FAR 52.225-23
Something you write
Days to weeks, and nobody outside your company has to agree to it.
- FAR 52.225-23(c)
A request to the contracting officer for a determination that the restriction does not apply, carrying the market survey and the cost comparison table in the format (d) sets — each material with its unit, quantity and delivered cost, and the surveyed suppliers' names, contacts and responses
Owed when material outside both lanes is needed, on unreasonable cost, on domestic nonavailability, or on the public interest; a request made after award has to explain why the need could not reasonably have been foreseen
When it is used
The large-project twin of 52.225-21, and equally Recovery Act bound. FAR 25.1102(e) substitutes 52.225-23 for 52.225-11 when the construction is funded by appropriations under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009; the clause text confirms it, referring to 'the restrictions of section 1605 of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Pub. L. 111-5) (Recovery Act).' The underlying 52.225-11 band is construction performed in the United States valued at $6,683,000 or more; Alternate I covers the sub-band from $6,683,000 to under $13,749,689, where Bahrain, Mexico and Oman are excluded from the designated-country relief because their construction thresholds sit higher. Absent ARRA funding — every subcontract in this corpus — FAR 25.1102 routes to 52.225-11 and this clause has no application.
Read closely
above the $6,683,000 line the trade agreements open a second lane that 52.225-21 does not have: designated country manufactured and unmanufactured material comes out from under the restriction, so a compliant path exists through designated-country sourcing. (b) names no origin document. As with 52.225-21, everything on this row turns on Recovery Act funding being behind the project.
Alternates
Alt I · Nov 2023
FAR 25.1102(e), substituting for the 52.225-11 Alternate I prescription at 25.1102(c) — Recovery Act funded construction valued at $6,683,000 or more but less than $13,749,689.
Alt I narrows the designated-country lane, putting Bahraini, Mexican and Omani material back under the restriction because those three carry construction thresholds above the bottom of the trade agreement band. It moves which material qualifies, not the origin evidence you collect or the cost comparison table behind a request under (c).
Source: acquisition.gov, FAR 52.225-23 and Alternate I (full paragraph structure), FAR 25.1102 (chapeau and paragraphs (c), (e)), and FAR 25.402(b) (verified 2026-08-05)
This is research, not legal advice. It states what the regulation says about this clause and cites the paragraph behind it. It does not rule on your order, and it does not rule on whether a prime's markings are correct.