Auckland is the largest urban area in New Zealand. With its 100 km of coastline, Auckland is known as 'The City of Sails'. 

Auckland Council was formed in October 2010 with the amalgamation of eight councils into one ‘super city’. The first five years of this new governance structure have been transformative. A new and wide-reaching Procurement Strategy has been developed to reflect the priorities of the Auckland Plan. The strategy sets out six principles:

• Work together
• Value te Ao Māori (the Māori world)
• Be sustainable
• Act fairly
• Make the best use of every dollar
• Be affordable.

Aligning with the strategy is mandatory for all council procurement so that Auckland Council can use the power of its significant budget as a transformational change agent.

The Council is also working in partnership with other organizations, including the New Zealand Sustainable Business Council, on supply chain management advice. Together with the Sustainable Business Network, the council is developing the Circular Economy Model Office Guide. This guide covers hard fit-out and furniture selection of an office refurbishment or new build and shares practical knowledge and experience on reuse, recycling, deconstruction and waste management.

The new procurement approach has contributed to a number of successes for sustainability. Among them, the refit of Auckland Council’s headquarters building, aiming for a new standard of excellence for green building retrofits in New Zealand. Considerations such as product stewardship and take-back, sustainable certification of products and supply chain validation drove an exemplary process and resulted in an exemplary building.  One year into occupancy, the building is using around 40 per cent less energy than before the refit and is currently awaiting its Green Star rating. Another good example is the conversion to LED street lighting: a total of 43,000 street lights are being converted by Auckland Transport, saving NZ$36 million over 20 years. The scale of this project is helping lead change to LEDs across New Zealand.