Council of the European Union
Two years ago, in June 2022 the Council of the European Union published a set of conclusions on sustainable procurement which were an evolution of a 2020 set of conclusions suggesting the introduction of criteria or targets for sustainable procurement. It would seem that the Council was behind the idea
Public Procurement
The Letta report on the single market (Much more than a market) released yesterday contains some ideas for public procurement, namely achieving higher integration for the public procurement market while realising strategic goals. These are explored in detail in a reasonably sized section called 'A more European and more
Portugal
I mentioned a couple of times in this blog that the 2021 reform to the Portuguese Public Contracts Code implemented some questionable choices under the guise of facilitating the award of contracts to make the most of the Recovery and Resilience Facility. However, until now I had not noticed what
Next week I will be taking part at two events run by the Centre for Climate Change Law and Governance at the University of Copenhagen. On Monday and Tuesday I will be at the Interdisciplinary workshop on Green Public Procurement presenting what is quickly becoming my stump speech - sorry,
Procurement Act 2023
While the time is not right to talk about what I will be doing with the Procurement Act 2023, I can reflect on the philosophy that seems to permeate it. As a golden opportunity to design a new procurement system from scratch the Act is a disappointment as I have
Portuguese general elections 2024
For this final entry into the ongoing series about the party manifestos for the upcoming Portuguese general election this Sunday we will be looking into the two smallest parties in parliament: PAN (Greens/European Free Alliance) and Livre (Greens/European Free Alliance). PAN (Greens/European Free Alliance) PAN has three
Portuguese general elections 2024
After the first two entries into the series (here and here), it is now the turn to look at the more left-wing parties in Portuguese parliament: Bloco de Esquerda (GUE/NGL) and the CDU (GUE/NGL). Bloco de Esquerda (GUE/NGL) Bloco de Esquerda offers three proposals connected with public
Portuguese general elections 2024
I published on Friday the first entry in a series looking into the various electoral manifestos from the parties running in the upcoming Portuguese general election. Today it is the turn of Chega (ID) and Iniciativa Liberal (ALDE). They're both recent additions to the roster of parties with
With just over a week to go until the general election in Portugal I am looking into the various parties proposals for public procurement. I will be following the 2022 results in order: starting with PS the most voted down to Livre, the final party with a seat in the
Even though eForms became mandatory back in October 2023 and existing standard forms system is about to be disconnected, Portugal is yet to introduce its eForm implementation. The existing system will be turned off this evening in the expectation it will come back online next Monday morning. So, if you
Ukraine
EU's pledge to deliver 1M artillery shells to Ukraine by March 2024 faces obstacles due to insisting on producing them within the EU. Some member states allegedly block sourcing from outside the EU. Industrial policy clashes with timely supply.
sustainability
A couple of years ago I attended a sustainable public procurement conference and asked one of the speakers about the tradeoffs adding more sustainable objectives to procurement would entail. In short, there are no free lunches and as such - on aggregate and at scale - this is likely to