Cape Town (South Africa) aims to become the greenest city in Africa. The City of Cape Town (the City) is a major buyer of goods and services in the region; as such sustainable procurement aims to ensure that this significant buying power is focused on environmentally responsible products that are locally manufactured where possible, in order to promote local economic development and more sustainable consumption and production.

Responsibility for implementing sustainable procurement is shared. The City’s Environmental Management Department leads the City’s sustainable procurement approach, in conjunction with the Supply Chain Management Department. In general, the City has committed to implementing green procurement in its operations and capital projects, through its Environmental Strategy. Additionally, green procurement has already been included in the City’s Supply Chain Management Policy as one of seven desired outcomes and principle, and as such has created the conditions for consideration of environmental concerns to be included in procurement decisions.

Many provisions related to socially-responsible procurement have been incorporated into the City’s Supply Chain Management Policy. These include provisions on preferential procurement for small businesses (SMMEs), broad-based black economic empowerment (BBEE), and localisation criteria for certain sectors.

Notably, in 2020 the City of Cape Town finalised a Green Procurement Action Plan. The overall aim of the action plan is to define a set of principles to guide green procurement decision-making, define a set of desired objectives and outcomes for the City to strive towards achieving, and lay out the specific actions required to effectively transition towards green procurement in all of the City’s operations and purchasing decisions.  

The Action Plan has seven key objectives, namely:

1. Ensure that the City has in place appropriate policies to support green procurement, including associated administrative tools.

2. Maximise the City’s sourcing and purchasing of sustainable products.

3. Maximise the City’s sourcing and purchasing of sustainable services.

4. Increase the number of green/sustainable buildings built by the City, with a long term aim of a complete transition to green/sustainable building.

5. Incorporate green procurement into the City’s large capital projects.

6. Communicate effectively with the public, City contractors and City staff regarding green procurement.

7. Monitor and evaluate the City’s performance in terms of green procurement.

The Action Plan furthermore has twenty outcomes and 47 actions or activities, aimed at achieving the above objectives. Explore more here.