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Pre-qualification involves the vetting of suppliers by purchasers to identify those able to meet a required standard. The vetting is usually undertaken prior to inviting tenders and leads to the suppliers being placed on an approved list from which budget holders can invite tenders and make purchases. The inclusion of environmental (and social) criteria in the vetting process is an important way in which sustainable procurement can be implemented. The vetting process can consider both whole company policies and procedures and the qualities associated with particular products (for example the award of particular eco-labels).
Examination of publicly available materials (eg published environmental and corporate social responsibility reports, award of eco-labels etc) can provide some of the information that may be needed, but in nearly all cases, engagement with the supplier to gather specific, focussed, and up-to-date data will be needed.
A relatively simple approach to acquire information is through using a questionnaire, supplemented by dialogue with the supplier. To see an example of a questionnaire (which is focussed on environmental aspects) click here.
Organisations may audit their suppliers and prospective suppliers at different points in the purchasing process, using a variety of approaches. Auditing can be carried out by environmental specialists, but frequently, environmental auditing is combined with other forms of auditing, particularly quality auditing.
The EU rules for procurement by public agencies are strict about what can be considered when selecting firms to be invited to tender and the EU documentation contains an exhaustive list of permissible requests for information. Only information that is to be used to influence the decision should be requested and a contracting authority cannot consider the same criteria twice, that is, it can look at supplier policies as part of selection, but it cannot look at them again at the contract award stage. To see some frequently asked questions and answers in the EC's Interpretative Communication on public procurement relating to pre-qualification click here.
Tenders for goods and services can be used to make sustainable purchasing an integral part of business operations, particularly where sustainability criteria are used in tendering documents alongside more traditional criteria such as quality, delivery and fitness for purpose.
The evaluation criteria can be set by internal customers and purchasers working together and suppliers will appreciate the signal being sent if sustainability criteria are explicitly part of the routine of purchasing practice. The same principles should be applied even to relatively minor purchases. Tendering and tender evaluation with sustainability in mind involves:
The evaluation criteria should reflect the products and services being purchased; examples of generic criteria are given here.
Different weightings can be given to different criteria, so that, for example, environmental factors could be given a higher weighting where there is a higher environmental risk.
Whole-Life Costing processes can also be used in the evaluation of competing bids
Many purchasers are unclear about the extent to which environmental and sustainable purchasing is consistent with the requirements of the EC Procurement Directives. Public bodies need to be aware of what is possible when contract values fall below EU threshold levels, and how this differs from what can be done when the contract value is above the threshold. The EC issued guidance on 'the Community law applicable to public procurement and the possibilities for integrating environmental considerations into public procurement' in July 2001 (COM (2001) 274 final). The document and a useful series of frequently asked questions are shown here and can be found at:
www.europa.eu.int/comm/internal_market/en/publproc/general/environment.htm
Similar guidance relating to social considerations was issued in October 2001 (COM (2001) 566 final) See: www.europa.eu.int/comm/internal_market/en/publproc/general/01-324.htm
The guidance indicates that environmental issues should be considered as early as possible in the purchasing process, whereas social issues are best addressed during the execution of a contract.
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