Circular Procurement - A Means towards Sustainability

Dear Colleagues,

The purchasing power of public and private organizations has great potential to create circular innovation by creating new demands for circularity (Alhola et al., 2018; Crafoord et al., 2018). Within the EU, public sector organizations spend EUR 2 trillion annually, accounting for 14% of the EU’s GDP (European Commission, 2021). The potential of using this purchasing power to drive circularity has been highlighted by scholars, practitioners and policymakers alike, e.g., in the New Circular Economy Action Plan by the European Commission, in which the importance of empowering private and public buyers for a circular economy is emphasized (European Commission, 2020). Recognizing the importance of demand as a driver of circular innovation has inspired this Special Issue.

This Special Issue focuses on the potential of public and private procurement and purchasing in enabling a circular economy, and aims to collect up-to-date research papers that can contribute novel research to inform the further development of circular procurement as an innovation driver. Integrating the circular economy into procurement and purchasing activities requires attention to the actual needs to be met, as well as to the product, service, or solution that will best meet these needs. Furthermore, attention is given to new ways of collaborating, e.g., through public–private partnerships, innovation partnerships or other R&D activities within procurement and purchasing. Circular procurement requires rethinking how procurement and purchasing are practiced within both public and private organizations, which means that attention must be given to circular innovation related to the products and services needed, and not merely setting requirements related to the outer circles of the circular economy such as recycled or recyclable packaging. While circular strategies of narrowing and closing resource flows have been established for decades, special attention should be given to the strategy of slowing resource flows and, thus, the inner circles of the circular economy, as well as economic, environmental and social value creation through circular procurement.

Authors who wish to contribute to this Special Issue are invited to consider procurement in a lifecycle and process perspective, and we thus invite papers that apply a holistic perspective on circular procurement as well as papers paying specific attention to certain elements of circular procurement, e.g., market engagement, functional tendering, or environmental criteria. Contributions may focus on specific sectors, such as construction, furniture, textiles and electronics, and we encourage papers that address both small- and large-scale procurement (from small-scale products to large-scale projects).

This Special Issue invites authors to contribute with original research, through both conceptual and empirical papers, in the following fields:

• Circular public procurement;
• Green public procurement;
• Circular corporate procurement;
• Sustainable public procurement;
• Socially responsible procurement for circularity;
• Lifecycle costing/total cost of ownership;
• Circular and sustainable value creation;
• Innovation procurement;
• Public–private partnerships/industrial partnerships;
• The role of policies at different levels;
• Circularity in relation to ecolabels and procurement;
• Market dialogue as a method for circular tenders;
• Product life extension through procurement;
• Service versus products in public procurement.
  

References

Alhola, K., Ryding, S.-O., Salmenperä, H., & Busch, N. J. (2018). Exploiting the Potential of Public Procurement: Opportunities for Circular Economy. Journal of Industrial Ecology. https://doi.org/10.1111/jiec.12770

Crafoord, K., Dalhammar, C., & Milios, L. (2018). The use of public procurement to incentivize longer lifetime and remanufacturing of computers. Procedia CIRP, 73, 137–141. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.procir.2018.03.316

European Commission. (2020). A new Circular Economy Action Plan. https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/sustainable-consumption-production/

European Commission. (2021). Public procurement. https://ec.europa.eu/growth/single-market/public-procurement/strategy_en

Dr. Mette Alberg Mosgaard
Dr. Heidi Simone Kristensen
Prof. Dr. Arne Remmen
Guest Editors

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