International Review of Waste Management Policy - Department of ...

57.5.1 Barriers to Uptake of Green Public Procurement
The European Commission’s ‘Public Procurement for a Better Environment: Impact
Assessment’ details specific problems and barriers which are known to hinder the
uptake of green public procurement. They are listed below, but further details can be
found in the source document:
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29/09/09
1. Lack of awareness of benefits, misperception of the extent of costs, and
lack of political priority for GPP;
2. Legal problems;
3. Lack of information and tools for GPP, inadequate training structures, lack
of knowledge of priority areas and absence of easy to apply GPP criteria;
and
4. A lack of similarity between GPP procedures and criteria across the EU.
It is also felt that perceived legal problems, and general misperception over the scale
of the green procurement implementation process, hinder the take up of such a
policy. 1083
57.5.2 Administrative Costs
Green procurement leads to consideration of a product or service’s whole life costs.
The overall saving made through implementation of GPP depends on the
administrative costs involved, and whether or not they offset the savings. A report to
Defra in 2006, which undertook a cost benefit analysis on sustainable public
procurement, found evidence to suggest that savings are made over time when the
GPP process has been established and administrative tasks have been integrated.
This means that the majority of associated costs are ‘one-off’ and once embedded
into the system they can begin to deliver value. As policy implementation internalises
environmental performance (emissions trading etc.) then Green Procurement starts
to become more cost-effective.
Administrative costs will depend on the current procurement processes in place, and
how these are managed. On average, individual authorities who are setting up and
implementing GPP spend a total of €223/1000 inhabitants over 2-6 years. 1084
57.6 Conclusions
In light of the European framework which is in place, Member States ought to be
striving to reach the target of 50% for the average level of green public procurement
by 2010. This target seems unlikely to be met by Ireland, and there is not yet any
formalised commitment to this as far as we are aware. The formalised EU framework
1083 National Audit Office (2009) Addressing the Environmental Impacts of Government Procurement,
Available: http://www.nao.org.uk//idoc.ashx?docId=56417d76-45d6-4181-916cda4c00b1bc88&version=-1
1084 Oko-Institut (2007) Costs and Benefits of Green Public Procurement in Europe, Available:
http://ec.europa.eu/environment/gpp/pdf/eu_recommendations_2.pdf