Sustainable procurement
Sustainable procurement aims to purchase goods and services to meet the needs of the University, whilst generating benefits for the economy and society, and reducing the impacts on the environment. Sustainability is being embedded across the University’s supply chain, influencing how we procure goods and services, the types of goods and services we procure, and how we manage their lifecycle.
Our plan for sustainable procurement
Surrey's Procurement Department have created a Sustainable Procurement Plan (PDF) with the Sustainability Team to action sustainability in the University’s supply chain.
To measure progress, we are using the government’s Flexible Framework (PDF), expanding this framework from five to ten stages to clarify actions and expedite delivery.
The University’s Procurement Policy (PDF) also states our commitment to ensuring sustainability, modern slavery, socially responsible procurement issues and equality/diversity factors are considered in purchasing decisions.
Taking action
Key sustainable procurement actions to date have been the development of Sustainability Impact Assessments, which set out the key environmental, social and economics impacts a product or service has and how to reduce the negative impacts. These have been used in a number of tenders including workwear and building services. The University is also assessing our suppliers to see what sustainability products they offer and how they operate as companies in terms of sustainability.
Auditing our supply chain
The University audits its supply chain using the NetPositive Futures tools ‘Supplier Engagement Tool’ and ‘Net Zero tool’. The University has over 3,000 suppliers providing products and services as diverse as IT support, furniture, lab equipment and uniforms with a carbon footprint of almost 70,000tco2e and a total spend of more than £100million.
To date the University has reviewed its 3000 suppliers, focussing on the top 70% of spend and carbon emissions, which equates to about 270 key suppliers. These suppliers’ range in size from multinational companies like Dell, to SME’s with less than 50 members of staff. This list of 270 suppliers has been further prioritised to focus on 40 companies which are critical and important to the University.
During the period 2024 to 2026 the Procurement team is engaging with these 40 companies to understand their carbon footprint and to work with them to reduce both their carbon emissions and their wider sustainability impact, using the two tool kits provided by NetPositive Futures.
Related sustainable development goals
