Documents procurement 36 results

"Climate change mitigation and the Green Deal will remain a central topic for the EU. As a major historical contributor to greenhouse gases, it has the opportunity to reverse this trend of ever more emissions, including by providing a model to leapfrog the carbon age: EU funding and the assessment of state aid and competition law; legal Instruments, including technical standardisation, criminal law sanctions and market-based measures, such as tax incentives or the future extension of emissions trading to consumers; education; the external dimension, a potential new green hegemony and the CBAM; social aspects; climate rights enforcement; and issues arising in specific sectors, including energy, transport, public procurement, urban planning and migration."

"This book provides the first comprehensive appraisal of the paradigm shift towards mandatory sustainability requirements in EU public procurement law.
Traditionally, EU public procurement law focused on 'how to buy', dictating procedural rules so that public buyers in the Member States did not discriminate against suppliers and service providers from other Member States. Mandatory green and social requirements mean that, with a view to achieving sustainable development goals and mitigating climate change, the EU will limit this discretionary power for public buyers, pushing them to acquire more sustainable goods and services.
Based on legal analysis informed by economic perspectives, the book aims to contribute to an understanding and critical discussion of the EU legislator's move towards regulating 'what to buy'. The book discusses the role of the Public Procurement Directives in relation to this paradigm shift, as well as various other sectoral legislative instruments that have been revamped or newly introduced in light of the European Green Deal.
The paradigm shift is analysed from different perspectives, including subsidiarity, alternative regulation, economics and public purchasing.
The book includes novel sectoral studies on transport, food, clothing, and construction, discussing how change is taking place and what its major challenges are for the future. Chapters on Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, and more, offer case studies of Member States that have already introduced mandatory requirements and highlight lessons learnt.
This is an essential book for professionals working with public procurement law in academia and practice, and to those engaged in achieving public policy objectives in light of climate change and social injustice."

"This report highlights how advancements in the EU's Green Public Procurement (GPP) process can pave the way for progress in Socially Responsible Public Procurement (SRPP). GPP and SRPP complement each other in the shared goal of transforming the EU into a fair and prosperous society with a modern and competitive economy as outlined in the EU Green Deal. This social dimension in public procurement also reflects the EU's commitments to the European Pillar of Social Rights Action Plan, the United Nations 2030 Agenda, and the Porto 2021 Social Commitment.
In this summary report, UNI Europa conducts a comparative analysis, mapping advancements in
the public procurement across several sectoral files encompassing Green Public Procurement (GPP)
in relation to Socially Responsible Public Procurement (SRPP), while evaluating them in comparison
to the previous legislative files:
1. Clean Vehicles Directive
2. Energy Performance of Buildings Directive
3. Energy Efficiency Directive
4. Net Zero Industry Act Regulation
5. Energy Labelling Directive & Regulation
6. Batteries Regulation Directive & Regulation
7. Ecodesign of Sustainable Products Directive & Regulation
8. Construction Products Regulation
9. Packaging and Packaging Waste Directive & Regulation."

"The Global Dialogue Forum on the Adaptability of Companies to Deal with Fluctuating Demands and the Incidence of Temporary and Other Forms of Employment in Electronics, held in Geneva 9-11 December 2014, requested a series of actions to be taken by the International Labour Office (ILO), which included among other things to conduct research on the impact of purchasing practices in the electronic sector on labour rights and temporary and other forms of employment. Additionally, the Meeting of Experts on Non-Standard Forms of Employment held in Geneva on 16-19 February 2015 put the Office in charge of documenting and analysing trends on the effects of non-standard forms of employment on workers and their protection.

The electronics industry is characterized by supply chains network with a high level of outsourcing and subcontracting. In recent years, lead firms have increasingly outsourced manufacturing, as well as pre- and post- manufacturing activities. This led to the development of large intermediary contract manufacturers, working with a vast base of suppliers. For instance, Foxconn has grown to become the world's largest contract manufacturer of electronic goods, and manages a vast network of buyers and suppliers. In this context of multi-tiered production, suppliers face numerous challenges regarding timing, and a context of very flexible employment has emerged, with among other things employers resorting extensively to temporary workers."

" Trade negotiations involving international public procurement rules are on the rise, stimulating a growing interest in having a clear picture of the economic stakes involved, including the current level of international openness. A recent paper published by the European Centre for International Political Economy (Messerlin, 2016) made an attempt to provide a range of estimates for the EU and the US and found relatively low rates of import penetration. This analytical approach, however, looked only at the ‘tip of the procurement iceberg', as the data used covered primarily only one modality of international procurement (direct cross-border), which is not the main avenue for international government procurement. Other modalities, such as procurement from foreign subsidiaries established in Europe, account for much more. Such an approach therefore ignores the main modalities through which foreign firms win EU contracts. Once these other main procurement modalities are taken into account, EU openness in procurement is much higher. Comparable data across all modalities do not yet exist for the US, but we do have clear evidence that the US has introduced the largest number of protectionist procurement measures since 2008 affecting all modalities for international procurement.

Against this background, this Policy Brief makes four basic points:

i. Public procurement is a key area of trade negotiations, and TTIP is no exception to this rule.

ii. The existing levels of openness in procurement markets need to be assessed across all three main procurement modalities and not based only on direct cross-border procurement, which is not the main procurement avenue. According to this comprehensive metric, the EU market already has a high foreign participation rate, including by US companies.

iii. Unfortunately, similar data do not exist for the US market. But there is growing evidence of discriminatory measures introduced in recent years, which impede the ability of EU firms to compete on a level-playing field in US procurement markets.

iv. The importance of procurement as a key negotiating area requires better data and a greater analytical engagement."

"This article examines the influence of labour market factors on public authorities' decisions to outsource public services in five countries. The dominant focus in the outsourcing literature is on a narrow range of factors: public–private gaps in pay, union membership and collective bargaining coverage. We find such differences to be variable, and develop a more encompassing perspective. This includes consideration of labour market rules that establish wage floors and employment protection (especially for outsourced workers) and the possible differentiation of legal status between public and private employees. Our case studies from local government in five countries highlight a set of country-specific interconnections between labour market factors and outsourcing. These lead to variations in both managers' and unions' approaches towards outsourcing and in outcomes for pay and working conditions. We call for a strengthening of the inclusiveness of industrial relations structures to combat problems of workforce fragmentation caused by outsourcing."

"Mit dem Bedeutungszuwachs der oeffentlichen Auftragsvergabe werden Entscheidungen ueber Arbeitsbedingungen zunehmend jenseits der eingespielten Formen des Interessenausgleichs getroffen. Welche Verfahren der Entscheidungsfindung sich hier herausbilden und wie dies die etablierten Macht- und Interessenstrukturen in den industriellen Beziehungen veraendert, ist Kernfrage des Beitrags. Er zielt zudem darauf, Einflussfaktoren, Gegenstaende, Akteure und Mechanismen der Entscheidungsfindung im Bereich der oeffentlichen Auftragsvergabe in systematisierender Weise zu beschreiben und auf diese Weise zu einem besseren Verstaendnis der Konturen dieser emergenten Arena der industriellen Beziehungen beizutragen. Die Auswertung erster empirischer Studien zu Deutschland, Daenemark und Grossbritannien ergibt, dass die gezielte Nutzung der Auftragsvergabe als Instrument der Arbeitsmarktregulierung laenderuebergreifend auf grosse Huerden stoesst, und die traditionell staerker ausgepraegten Mitbestimmungsrechte von Arbeitnehmern in Deutschland und vor allem Daenemark in dieser emergenten Arena der industriellen Beziehungen bislang nur bedingt zum Tragen kommen."

"This working paper provides a legal analysis of the inclusion of social and environmental clauses in the modernisation of the EU's public procurement directives. It focuses in particular on Directive 2014/24/EU and evaluates the measures and provisions dealing with the obligation to comply with social, environmental and labour laws. It concludes that the co-legislators have managed to give contracting authorities and member states a lever to introduce more ethics in economic relations."