Production of ecological products will be encouraged by public procurement
A green light was lit for a breakthrough in green procurement. The Ministry of Environment proposed legislative changes that are necessary to achieve the ambitious goals of green procurement.
“Green procurement is an exotic phrase so far. They must soon become the standard. The public sector is a huge contracting authority. We offer the state to buy construction works using ecological building materials and recycled materials more intensively, to buy green energy, ecological products. The state will automatically stimulate the green revolution with its purchasing power,” says Minister of the Environment Simonas Gentvilas.
The proposed amendments change the current overly narrow concept of green procurement, extend the use of certificates and eco-labels, update environmental criteria in the areas of transport and food, and allow green procurement where no environmental criteria are provided.
This is the first step in updating the environmental criteria for public procurement. It will be continued in other product groups this year.
The government’s program envisages that from 2023 onwards green procurement must become the dominant type of public procurement. NATIONAL PROGRESS PROGRAM sets a target that green procurement would account for 55% of all purchases by value – even 16 times more than now. In 2019, these purchases in Lithuania accounted for only 3.3 percent total procurement values.
Billions of euros are spent on public procurement every year. If most of them are carried out in accordance with environmental principles, environmental pollution will be reduced, green innovations and the production of ecological products will be encouraged.
