Procurement

As part of the University’s commitment to developing its organisational resilience, and to mitigating the loss of goods and services that support its critical academic, research, and support functions, it will incorporate measures into its procurement processes and procedures to evaluate the effectiveness of its critical suppliers’ business continuity arrangements.

At a local level

The University of Galway's 2023 Procurement Policy pledges to ‘incorporate the use of Green Procurement practices in our processes and procedures, in an effort to reduce our environmental impact in conjunction with CUSP’.‌

Clause 15 of the University of Galway's Procurement Policy relates to sustainability. The University is committed to working with the relevant Government agencies to develop green procurement criteria that will be used where relevant when tendering for goods, services and works. The University of Galway will incorporate the use of Green Procurement practices in our processes and procedures, in an effort to reduce the university's environmental impact in conjunction with the Community University Sustainability Programme (CUSP). Green Procurement practices are procurement competitions that seek to procure goods, services and works with a reduced environmental impact throughout their life cycle when compared to goods, services and works with the same primary function that would otherwise be procured.

In incorporating sustainable and social considerations into tenders, Units need to ensure that:

• the sustainable and social consideration does not result in discrimination,
• sustainable and social considerations are linked to the subject matter of the contract,
• value for money is maintained to ensure sustainable delivery of services,
• the objective of the sustainable and social consideration is proportionate to the contract,
• the targeted benefit is capable of being measured and monitored during the execution of the contract (the necessary staffing, arrangements and resources should be allocated to this task having regard to the principle of proportionality), and
• the clauses do not negatively impact on the SME sector

At a national level

Green Procurement in Policy:

The Climate Action Plan 2023 requires every public body to have a climate mandate, a key element of that is using public procurement to deliver change.

Circular 20/2019, published by the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform, promotes the use of environmental and social considerations in public procurement and provides Government Departments with information and instructions for including green criteria across all their procurement processes.  

The Waste Action Plan for a Circular Economy contains a series of measures to expand and strengthen the usage of Green Public Precurement in Ireland.

Green Procurement Guidance

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has published Guidance on Green Procurement; a practical resource tool, designed to assist procurers to build green criteria into public tenders. It covers eight sectors: Road transport vehicles and services, energy, construction, food and catering services, cleaning products and services, textiles and uniforms, office IT equipment and paper