Find out about voluntary criteria, green public procurement requirements in sectoral legislation and the process for setting criteria.
Library of case studies on green and socially responsible public procurement
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What is Green Public Procurement?
Green Public Procurement (GPP) is defined in the Communication (COM -2008- 400) "Public procurement for a better environment" as "a process whereby public authorities seek to procure goods, services and works with a reduced environmental impact throughout their life cycle when compared to goods, services and works with the same primary function that would otherwise be procured."
While GPP is a voluntary instruments and Members States are able to determine the extent to which policies or criteria are applied, it plays a key role in the EU's efforts to boosting a resource-efficient economy.
GPP is within the framework of Strategic Public Procurement, together with Socially Responsible Public Procurement (SRPP) and Innovation Procurement. The basic concept of GPP relies on having clear, verifiable, justifiable, and ambitious environmental criteria for products and services, based on a life-cycle approach and scientific evidence base.
The European Commission (EC) has been developing voluntary GPP criteria for several product groups. Furthermore, following the adoption of the 2020 Circular Economy Action Plan, the Commission is proposing minimum mandatory GPP criteria and targets in sectoral legislation and phase in compulsory reporting to monitor its uptake.
EU Ecolabels: Labels can play a particular role in developing technical specifications and award criteria, and in verifying compliance helping public buyers to save time in accordance with Art. 43 of Directive 2014/24/EU. More information on EU Ecolabel product groups is available online.
News
The University of Alcala’s Green Public Procurement research group was founded in 2017 by Professor Xemena Lazo Vitoria
The EU GPP Helpdesk hosted its first webinar of 2024 on 7 March titled 'Mainstreaming a profession: the Professionalisation of Public Procurement'.
The Procura+ Awards ceremony took place on 13 March at the Procura+ Conference in Lisbon, Portugal.
European Commission training on socially responsible public procurement destined to public authorities and social economy entities.
The Government of Estonia adopted a Public Procurement Strategy. It aims to work towards fulfilling the country’s strategy “Estonia 2035”.
Procurement category: Electric vehicles
Procurement category: Research
This tool has been developed in the framework of the CityLoops project.
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Training materials on green public procurement
Find out more about publications, studies and current GPP projects
Learn more about the Life-cycle costing tool and how it can help public buyers
Check out the National Action Plans and the activities of the Green Public Procurement Advisory Group