The concept of materiel is extremely all encompassing in regards to the project management process. Materiel, in the big picture sense, is comprised of the complete and total aggregate of all things and items that are used by an organization or group in any particular undertaking. The individual items that may make up the entirety of the materiel include any equipment, tools, apparatus, machinery, gear, supplies, and assorted “materials”. Materiel may be important to keep track of from a budgetary standpoint. Please keep in mind, the spelling of this word is to be noted. It is spelled differently from the commonly spelled word “material”. This unique spelling, among other things, should set the project management concept of materiel apart from the more generic word material, which would only refer to general items, of general components, and would need to be further modified to have any real understanding of what exactly the word referred to.
This term is defined in the 3rd and the 4th edition of the PMBOK.