Circular Economy in public procurement in the Coimbra Region IMC

This approach aims to reduce the overall volume of product waste. According to the European Parliament, each European citizen consumes an average of 14 tonnes of raw materials per year, which generate around 5 tonnes of waste each year.

These products, materials and waste must be reused, repaired or recycled, moving away from the linear economy that has been in force since the industrial revolution. Although the advent of recycling, which introduced key concepts such as reducing, reusing and recycling, has significantly contributed to waste reduction, it is still lacking, as it does not eliminate a practice that would lead to the destruction of our habitat.

The next step is ambitious and aims to signal a new phase in which material lifetimes are prolonged in order to reduce the need for raw materials and waste.

Change does not start at the end of the process, as was the case with the transition from linearity to recycling. This time, the change has to be radical and it starts at the very beginning: in the design of the product/service and its production or re-manufacturing. It subsequently extends to transportation and distribution or access to transport and distribution, and to their pattern of use/consumption.

A new standard emerges, which is the reuse or regeneration that leads to goods re-entering the consumption chain. Those that cannot be monetized or repaired will then be recycled, giving rise to new goods for consumption.

Removal of materials from this new cycle will only occur through wear and tear.

This ambitious approach to consumption allows us to predict the complexity that public procurement faces in preparing circularity requirements for purchase of goods and services procedures.