Registration is now open for the EcoProcura 2018 conference on sustainable, circular, and innovation procurement, taking place from 3-5 October in Nijmegen (Netherlands). EcoProcura 2018, marking 20 years of the conference series, will bring together over 400 procurers, policy makers, businesses, researchers and international organisations.

The interactive programme will present, discuss and identify ways of using procurement as an effective tool in the strategic decision making process of a public authority. It will focus on important policy areas for sustainable, innovative and circular future, such as sustainable mobility, renewable energy and low carbon infrastructure. Approaches to organisational culture and behaviour change to achieve sustainable, innovation and circular procurement will also be explored.  In addition, participants will have the chance to learn more about topics such as, life-cycle costing, design of specifications and monitoring of contracts.

Confirmed speakers for the conference include Dr. Bertrand Piccard, Chairman, Solar Impulse Foundation, Hubert Bruls, Mayor of Nijmegen, Katrin Stjernfeldt Jammeh, Mayor of Malmö (Sweden) and Mark Hidson, Global Director, ICLEI’s Sustainable Procurement Centre, with further speakers to be announced soon.

The deadline for call for contributions for the Market Lounge, Speed Presentation, Disruptors and Game Changers, and Supplier Engagement conference sessions has been extended to 18 May 2018. Procurement practitioners, public authorities, policy makers, suppliers and legal experts are invited to submit proposals online via the EcoProcura 2018 website.

For more information and to register, or submit a proposal to the call for contributions, visit the EcoProcura 2018 website.

Warsaw MZA bus operator, which is a municipal company controlled by the City of Warsaw (Poland), has purchased 130 low floor, low emission electric busses with associated infrastructure.

The move makes it the largest project on e-buses in the whole region of Central-Eastern Europe and constitutes a major step forward towards the transformation of Warsaw urban transportation, in turn lessening its dependency on fossil fuels.

The project includes as many as 130 buses, one tenth of the vehicle stock of Warsaw MZA municipal bus operator, together with modern associated infrastructure, including construction of aerial chargers at ends of selected bus lines and adaptation of bus depots.

The total cost of the project is estimated at 89 498 576 USD, which will be paid in part through financing from the Polish Operational Programme “Infrastructure and Environment”, which distributes EU Assistance funds, and in part through the City of Warsaw.

In the long run the project is hoped to assist the Poland-wide trend towards electric mobility, limiting risks related to CO2 emissions generated by fossil fuels consumed in the transportation sector worldwide.

The project will also massively reduce the amount of pollutants such as NOx and SO2, which are generated by Diesel buses, and will also massively reduce noise pollution in the Polish capital.

For more information about Warsaw’s Sustainable Procurment work, visit their profile on the GLCN website.

GLCN Member Oslo‘s Vice Mayor for Finance Robert Steen has used the 15th Procura+ Seminar to highlight how innovative public procurement strategies can achieve ambitious targets at the city level.

Vice Mayor Steen delivered an opening speech to more than 100 delegates at the Procura+ European Sustainable Procurement Network‘s flagship seminar event hosted by the city of Oslo, a long-term network participant.

“Public procurement is one of the most powerful tools to lower emissions, and it can achieve its full potential through ambitious, coordinated strategies at the city and regional level,“ said Mayor Steen.

“Oslo‘s climate budget and procurement strategy will enable it to achieve significant and quantifiable emissions reductions. By working with other cities and public authorities through the Procura+ network, we hope that Oslo‘s approach can be replicated elsewhere,” he added.

The seminar was also used as the occasion to announce the Procura+ network‘s new chairperson, Mayor of Malmö (Sweden), Katrin Stjernfeldt Jammeh.

“Since Malmö joined in 2012, Procura+ has evolved from a campaign to a diverse network of public authorities and strategic partners with new interest groups on circular and socially responsible public procurement. The field of procurement itself is becoming more embedded and diversified, as policy-makers from local government to the European level realise the potential of public spend as a tool to achieve environmental and social objectives. It is through seminars like today‘s that public authorities build their capacity and confidence to implement sustainability measures with tangible results,“ said Mayor Stjernfeldt Jammeh.

The Procura+ Seminar, organised by ICLEI - Local Governments for Sustainability , a global network of more than 1,500 cities, towns and regions, gathered over 100 procurement practitioners and policy makers to discuss how sustainable and innovation procurement can be used to help public authorities meet strategic objectives in a cost effective way. The seminar was hosted by the City of Oslo and organised in the context of the SPP Regions sustainable procurement networking project.

Procura+ was founded by ICLEI - Local Governments for Sustainability in 2004. It quickly grew into a significant Europe- wide movement, with participating cities playing an active role in driving its activities. As the number of members grew, the campaign transitioned into a network of European public authorities and regions in 2015. New public authority participants include the Greater London Authority Group (UK) and Haarlem (Netherlands). Public authorities use the network to connect, exchange, and act on sustainable and innovation procurement.

“Having been at the forefront of advancing the sustainable and innovation procurement agenda for twenty-two years, ICLEI is particularly proud of the success story of the Procura+ network. Going beyond merely identifying the potential of public procurement, the network actually supports and guides public authorities in implementing sustainable practices to achieve tangible emissions reductions, and often financial savings,“ said Mark Hidson, Global Director of ICLEI’s Sustainable Procurement Centre.

“The objectives of the Paris Agreement cannot be unlocked by national governments alone; it has never been more crucial that cities and regions lead the way collaboratively in setting and achieving emissions targets, and use their economic leverage to drive innovation for social and environmental ends,“ he added.

For more information about Oslo's Sustainable Procurement work, read their Sustainable Procurement Profile on our website.