Sustainable Procurement

Standard medical ethics dictate “primum non nocere” (first, do no harm). While health care saves lives, it can also harm the environment and threaten the ability to guarantee good health for future generations.

The health sector, whose mandate is to prevent and cure disease, makes a major contribution to the global climate crisis. In fact, if the global health sector were a country, it would be the fifth-largest greenhouse gas emitter on the planet[1]. The global health sector releases greenhouse gases while delivering care and procuring products and technologies from a carbon-intensive supply chain. Health care contributes to carbon emissions through energy consumption, transport, and products manufactured, used, and disposed of.

As COVID-19 progressed in 2020 and 2021, the health systems’ impact on human and planetary health has increased resulting in an equally increased need to procure health care commodities. This created an unprecedented challenge to health care waste management across the globe, a process that has ripple effects in many regions of the world, especially in developing nations. As the number of patients needing health care exploded, managing massive health care waste became a challenge.

While there has been an urgent call for health commodities to be delivered to all corners of the world, there is still a significant need to ensure the upholding of sustainable standards and dimensions. In response to COVID-19, health systems are rethinking their supply chains, and the opportunity to integrate future pandemic preparedness with principles of climate resilience, adaptation, mitigation, and sustainability arises.

Procurement, done sustainably, has the potential to decrease health sector’s contribution to the climate crisis and advance the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). By greening our health systems, especially in the areas of procurement and supply chains, we can treat people without harming the environment.

In 2012, recognizing the potential to contribute to climate action, development, humanitarian, governance and peacebuilding nexus through sustainable procurement, seven UN agencies (UNDP, UNICEF, UNEP, UNFPA, UNHCR, WHO, UNOPS) and three global health financing institutions (Unitaid, The Global Fund and Gavi) joined forces under the UN Sustainable Procurement in the Health Sector (SPHS) initiative to contribute to more sustainable health systems and inclusive greener economies. The SPHS, whose secretariat is hosted by UNDP IRH, is supporting the development and implementation of sustainable and ethical procurement policies that positively impact the global health care supply chain to achieve net-zero carbon emissions by 2050.

Furthermore, UNDP together with Health Care Without Harm (HCWH) is implementing the Sustainable Health in Procurement Project (SHiPP). The project addresses the intersection between health, human rights and the environment in 10 countries (Argentina, Brazil, China, India, Moldova, South Africa, Tanzania, Ukraine, Vietnam and Zambia). SHiPP promotes procurement practices that consider environmental and social impacts, as well as cost-efficiency and affordability when defining how processes can be sustainable and mainstreams gender and human rights including anti-corruption, transparency and accountability. 

What have we accomplished?

UNDP developed an environmental questionnaire to assess the performance of suppliers and manufactures of health commodities, promoting environmental and social sustainability.

We have been maintaining the SPHS platform to strengthen engagement with health care suppliers and manufacturers. The SPHS network unites global leaders and technical experts from over 90 countries and shares knowledge on events, projects and best practices related to sustainable health procurement, manufacturing, waste disposal and management.

In collaboration with partners, we helped Ministries of Health and UN procurers, suppliers and manufacturers understand, design and put into place sustainable health manufacturing, procurement, waste disposal and management practices.

We created several resources, including a list of chemicals of concern to health and environment; guidelines on sustainable procurement; and a guidance note for COVID-19 health care waste management to help decrease negative impacts on people and the planet.

We established the Sustainable Procurement Index for Health (SPIH), a measurement tool for policy makers, manufacturers, suppliers, procurers and health care facilities end users. The index is designed to provide an incentive for entities to improve their environmental and social sustainability record.

We organized three Saving Lives Sustainably Global Forums (Asia 2018, Africa 2019 and Arab States 2020), featuring some of the world’s most eminent thinkers and practitioners who initiated important discussions on the global heath sector’s sustainable production, procurement, and logistics’ supply chains. The events provided opportunity for global health sector stakeholders, consisting of UN agencies, international organisations, governments, policymakers, multilateral financial institutions, manufacturers, technical experts, academia, philanthropists, humanitarian supply management and logisticians, civil society organisations and others to explore the current state of the health commodities’ sector in relation to sustainable consumption and production patterns and how they contribute to Development, Humanitarian and Peace nexus.

We worked with the government of Ukraine to reform its health procurement system, generating preliminary savings of over USD$12 million and improving overall access to quality medicine and vaccines.