Health care procurers meet EIC companies to discuss innovative medical solutions

In response to the current public health crisis, EIC Accelerator and ICLEI Europe have organized an online market engagement event. On April 30, public and private procurers from the health sector discussed their needs in the current crisis with 23 selected EIC companies who pitched their solutions for providing medical supply, such as personal protective garments, medication, test kits, respiratory machinery as well as innovative technologies such as tele-medicine, remote solutions, artificial intelligence for date analysis and prediction. 

The 50 health procurers at the pitching event expressed a need for better personal protection equipment, reliable test kits, new tele-health devices, and more efficient ways of managing their supply chain. The event was considered a great success by both the procurers attending, and the companies that presented their solutions.

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Shortlisted candidates for the Procura+ Awards 2020 announced

The shortlisted Procura+ Awards candidates have been announced in all four categories: Sustainable Procurement of the Year, Innovation Procurement of the year with the subcategory Outstanding Innovation Procurement in ICT, and Procurement Initiative of the year. The Procura+ Awards is an initiative of ICLEI, in co-operation with the EU-funded Procure2Innovate project.

Among the nominees are Procura+ participant City of Torres Vedras, Portugal, for its regional campaign to promote sustainable and healthy school meals, Procura+ participant City of Malmö, Sweden, for rethinking how ICT equipment can be bought to improve innovation and sustainability along the supply chain, Procura+ participant City of Copenhagen, Denmark, for systematically developing ecolabelling in procurement together with its suppliers, and the Finnish public service agency Sarastia Oy, for bringing automation and machine learning to handling invoices. An overview of all shortlisted candidates and summaries of their entries can be found on the Procura+ website.

This year has seen a record number of high quality applications and we thank all applicants for submitting their entry. We congratulate all shortlisted candidates and all applicants to keep up the good work. ICLEI will announce the finalists in August. Winners will be announced during an Award Ceremony later this year.

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New good practice cases report on socially responsible public procurement

The European Commission has just published a report collecting 71 good practice cases on how public buyers have implemented socially responsible public procurement (SRPP), in order to  promote employment opportunities, decent work, social inclusion, accessibility, ethical trade, design for all and seeking to achieve wider compliance with social standards. Written by ICLEI and AEIDL, with the support of Public Procurement Analysis, Dialog Makarna and Social Economy Europe, the report ‘Making Socially Responsible Public Procurement Work: 71 good practice cases’ aims to inspire public buyers around Europe to buy social.

The cases address a diverse selection of products and services, encompass all phases of the public procurement process, and include a broad range of public buyers, ranging from local and national governments, to public hospitals. All cases provide named contacts if you would be curious to learn more, directly from the practitioners.

Read the full article here.

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 More from our projects

New criteria guidance published for procuring fair ICT

ICLEI-Local Governments for Sustainability Europe and Electronics Watch published “How to procure fair ICT hardware - Criteria set for socially responsible public procurement” as part of their work in the Europe-Aid funded project ‘Make ICT Fair’.

The criteria document aims to support experienced procurers in leveraging public purchases of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) hardware to positively impact working conditions across the electronics supply-chain. The criteria set covers guidance on Subject Matter, Selection and Award Criteria, Technical Specifications as well as Contract Clauses. The criteria set is ambitious as it goes beyond smelter level but also addresses issues at the mining stage.

This guidance has been developed together with the Procura+ Interest Group on Socially Responsible Public Procurement of ICT hardware, coordinated by ICLEI Europe. The Interest Group consisted of procurers and experts on social aspects from the Advanced Procurement for Universities and Colleges (APUC) Scotland, Barcelona City Council, Greater London Authority, Municipality of Haarlem, Region Stockholm, Municipality of Stavanger, Municipality of Malmø, the City of Aalborg and Rijkswaterstaat.

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