Sustainable Procurement Project

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Sustainable Procurement Project

• Jimmy Brannigan
• ESD Consulting Ltd

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Sustainable Procurement Project

• In this session we will
• Explore our understanding of sustainable
  procurement
• Introduce some of the drivers and barriers to
  sustainable procurement
• Introduce the project
• Research
• Activities
• Questions and discussion

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What is sustainable procurement?
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What is sustainable purchasing?

• Sustainable purchasing is all about taking
  environmental and social factors into account in
  purchasing decisions. Its about looking at what
  your products are made of, where they come from
  and who has made them.
• Its even about looking at whether you need to
  make the purchase at all.
• Purchasing for Sustainability, Guidance for
  Higher Education

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What is sustainable development?
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What is sustainable purchasing?

• Looking for opportunities to reduce the negative
  environmental and social impacts of your
  purchasing choices though.
• What you buy
• How you buy it
• Who you buy it from

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Impacts of an institution
Inputs
Outputs

• Information
• Services
• Products
• Wastes

• Suppliers
• Energy
• Materials
• People

Operations
Environmental and social impacts
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Current management focus
Impacts and Opportunities (Environment)
High
Environmental Footprint
Natural Resources
Transportation
Manufacturing
Product Distribution
Consumers
Low
Supply Chain
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Current management focus
Current Management Effort (Environment)
High
Environmental Footprint
Natural Resources
Transportation
Manufacturing
Product Distribution
Consumers
Low
Supply Chain
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Current management focus
Mismatch between the two
High
Environmental Footprint
Natural Resources
Transportation
Manufacturing
Product Distribution
Consumers
Low
Supply Chain
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What is sustainable purchasing?

• Opportunities exist at all stages of the
  procurement process
• Identifying the need
• The specification
• Supplier qualification and appraisal
• Tendering and tender evaluation
• Contract management and contract review
• Accounting

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What are the drivers for sustainable procurement?
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Policies and Strategies

• LSC Sustainable Development Strategy
• HEFCE Sustainable Development in Higher Education

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The business case why do it?
Stakeholder demands
Employee expectations
Benchmarking
Customer requirements
Risk management
Legislation Standards
Business efficiencies
Impact Reduction (environmental)
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What does it mean for universities and colleges?

• Increasing pressure to become more sustainable
• Increasing pressure to balance the environmental
  alongside the social and economic considerations
• Opportunity through vast purchasing power to
  drive innovation

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What are the barriers to sustainable procurement
within your institution?
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Barriers to Sustainable ProcurementNational
Audit Office

• Whist there is a high level of commitment to
  national targets there is often a low level of
  understanding of the exact requirements,
  therefore creating an implementation gap the
  gap between policy and practice.
• Even with a high level commitment in the shape
  of policies and specific targets, this becomes
  heavily diluted by the time it reaches the
  Procurement Departments. A lot of the
  sustainability issues are lost and replaced
  instead by best value often easily translated
  to cheapest price.

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Barriers to Sustainable ProcurementNational
Audit Office

• The link needs to be made between sustainability,
  efficiency and cost savings.
• Procurement staff are often not trained in
  sustainability issues and do not understand how
  to achieve the targets. It is often the case that
  the will to procure in a sustainable manner is
  strong, yet the procurement teams are unable to
  complete the task. This often includes a basic
  misunderstanding of the term sustainable
  procurement.

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Barriers to Sustainable ProcurementNational
Audit Office

• Lack of knowledge in this area has often resulted
  of the seeming lack of understanding of the role
  of sustainability in risk assessments.

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Barriers to Sustainable ProcurementNational
Audit Office

• In Summary
• Lack of sustainable procurement training and
  guidance
• Poor understanding of targets and requirements
• Taking a short term view.

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Sustainable Procurement Project
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What support is available?

• DEFRA Environmental Action Fund- 3 year project
• Advice on how your college or university can
  implement Sustainable Procurement
• Training for your sustainability and purchasing
  team
• Access to advice and copies of all guidance
  materials and case studies developed through the
  project
• Reduce the impact of participating institutions
  (including students)

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Steering group

• FIREBUY
• Crescent Purchasing Consortium
• Southern Universities Purchasing Consortium
• North Eastern Universities Purchasing Group
• Sun Microsystems
• Blackpool and Fylde College

• Higher Education Funding Council for England
• Learning and Skills Council
• Learning and Skills Network
• NUS Services Limited
• Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply
• University of Hull
• Office Depot

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Project partners

• Bicton College
• Blackpool and Fylde College
• Nottingham Trent University
• Pershore Group of Colleges
• Suffolk College
• University of Hull
• University of Northampton
• University of the Arts London
• University of the West of England

• South Tyneside College
• University of Bristol
• University of Durham
• University of East London
• University of Gloucestershire
• University of Hertfordshire
• University of Plymouth
• University of Southampton
• Wigan and Leigh College
• Worcester College of Technology

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Research Where are we now?
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Structure

• Split into 3 areas
• Management and policy framework
• How purchasing is organised
• Understanding of current practice

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Management Framework

• Policies
• 63 Environmental Policy
• 79 Purchasing Policy
• 16 Sustainable Development Policy
• 5 CSR Policy
• Some specific policies 25 Energy, 31 Recycling,
  21 WLC
• Individual responsibility
• 84 Environment
• 73 Environment within Purchasing

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Management Framework

• Management Commitment
• 68 Management committed
• Based on what? Commitment to this project
• If not why not cost, no resources it will cost
  more money etc
• Environment or SD Team in place
• 63 Meets regularly
• 31 Have looked at procurement
• 53 Have some student involvement

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How is purchasing is organised?

• Central purchasing team
• 73 Yes
• sometimes very small - 1 average around 4-5
• Devolved purchasing
• 89 Yes
• 20 1000
• Purchasing guidance
• 89 Yes
• 47 Provide guidance on SD/Environmental issues

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How is purchasing is organised?

• Percentage of purchasing spend centrally
  controlled
• 31 below 50
• 69 above 50
• Do you have responsibility for any specific
  purchases?
• 79 Yes

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How is purchasing is organised?

• Have you been trained on sustainable purchasing?
• 20 people from 19 institutions (12 from one
  institution!)

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How is purchasing is organised?

• Are you a member of a purchasing consortium?
• 94 Yes
• 79 Said the consortium has env / soc policies
  in place
• Confusion as to how this has influenced specific
  commodities

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Current practice

• Do you include environmental and social
  considerations in any of your purchasing
  decisions
• 89 Yes
• Have you used a risk based approach?
• 10 Yes
• 26 Said students had influenced purchasing
  decisions

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Current practice

• Supplier engagement
• 42 Engage with suppliers on environmental and
  social issues
• 47 Use some form of questionnaire

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Summary

• Some good practice
• Lots of activity in a variety of places
• Opportunities to share between institutions
• Lack of general awareness
• Environmental focus rather than sustainability or
  CSR
• Challenge of devolved purchasers

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Current Activities

• Guidance being developed on
• Developing a business case
• Using cross functional teams
• Risk based approach to procurement

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Current Activities

• Training has been developed
• Train the trainer communicating sustainable
  procurement
• Risk based approaches to procurement
• Developing a sustainable procurement policy and
  strategy
• Supplier engagement for sustainability
• Social issue in the supply chain

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Questions

• jbrannigan_at_esdconsulting.co.uk
• www.eauc.org.uk