Participating in Standards Development to Shape Standards and Ecolabels that Meet Your Needs

An in-depth look at how and why purchasers can (and should) participate in standards development for certifications and ecolabels, in order to ensure their sustainability concerns are addressed, and that the standards accommodate the practical needs of purchasing professionals.

Green Cleaning in a Pandemic & Beyond

This track will cover two main topics: First, we’ll discuss the questions and concerns related to green cleaning that have become front and center as we live and work through the current pandemic as well as practical implications and solutions for purchasers. Second, we’ll look beyond the current pandemic to green cleaning products, practices, and strategies we can use to expand the focus of green-certified cleaning products to further increase sustainable purchasing.

Circular Procurement

Going beyond take back and recycling, the circular economy presents procurement with an important opportunity to include sustainability impact upfront, by influencing product design and material content, as well as material reuse. How do purchasers ensure that circularity efforts go beyond renaming existing recycling and materials recovery models and offer credible, verifiable progress toward the truly circular model of design, materials selection, repair and refurbishment, recovery, and reuse that they want to support? Our panels will examine this question from two angles: 1) Focusing in on those attributes and supply chain data that purchasers can use to credibly demonstrate and support claims of circularity; and 2) Taking a deep dive to explore how purchasers can collaborate to assess claims of circularity, and encourage more circular approaches, within the complex and resource-intensive electronics sector.

From Supply Chains to Value Networks: Risk, Resilience, Collaboration, and Sustainability

The supply chain is the source of greatest risk, and also the greatest opportunity for sustainability progress and value creation. The two panels in this track explore how to tackle this along two vectors: 1) Leveraging Industry Collaboration To Accelerate Sustainable Purchasing: Learn from two of the most successful programs (TfS and SPC)  how working together with peers to harmonize common standards and adopt shared tools can multiply success in supplier sustainability engagement. 2) Risk, Resilience and Sustainable Procurement: Leveraging Supply Chain Data/Transparency to Identify, and Mitigate Risks: This session’s experts connect the dots on types, breadth, and depth of supply chain data/intelligence, as well as how to feed it into strategies (like circular models) and connect to the rest of your organization to not only survive a crisis but thrive in the New Normal to follow.

Quantifying Embodied Carbon

In this track, we’ll explore how four companies, connected by a common purpose, are transforming their real estate and procurement programs to be climate champions. Brightworks will share new methodologies being developed to quantify embodied carbon across a real estate portfolio. Interface will speak to moving beyond LEED and their journey to reduce embodied carbon on their new HQ building. Mastercard will share their recent efforts at addressing embodied carbon and highlight their use of CDPs supplier disclosure platform to set science-based targets. Salesforce will highlight their goals for embodied carbon and the actions being taken in pursuit of Zero Carbon Certification. 

Strategies for Sustainable Food Procurement, from Packaging to Supporting Local Vendors

Institutional consumers, from colleges and universities to companies and government agencies, have multi-million dollar budgets that they are increasingly using to support sustainable products, suppliers, and supply chains. Food service, which includes food and food service ware, offers many opportunities for sustainability improvements – from sourcing locally grown produce and sustainably caught seafood to selecting less toxic, reusable food service ware. Learn how large institutional purchasers are leveraging their purchasing power to drive real change in food systems and food service ware products.

Collaboration and Innovation: Leveraging the power of data and strategic partnerships to support supplier diversity

Anchor institutions play a critical role in local communities and have the ability to have a significant positive impact through their procurement. To incorporate sustainability into procurement, institutional purchasers rely on a variety of innovative approaches. In this session, you will hear how:

– analytics can be leveraged to integrate sustainability and supplier diversity into strategic sourcing events

– incorporating supplier diversity requirements can drive innovative collaborations

– institutional purchasers can leverage partnerships to drive real change

Success Stories from Public Sector Sustainability Leaders

This track will present two complementary back-to-back 45-minute panels showcasing how several government agencies at the state and local level are designing and implementing successful sustainable purchasing initiatives that are aimed at yielding measurable environmental, social, and economic benefits. The strategies the panelists will discuss include staff engagement and education, carbon footprinting their jurisdiction’s purchasing activities, action planning, program evaluation and enhancement, outreach to vendors, and more.

Worker Impact

To address the full impact of goods and services, sustainable procurement considerations must go beyond the environmental. By incorporating requirements into contracts for living wages and improved factory conditions, establishing strong partnerships with suppliers, and buying products from companies that consider workers’ welfare as an essential, institutional buyers can meet their sustainable procurement goals and change the lives of workers across the globe. Join this session to learn how purchasers are having a positive impact on workers in a variety of supply chains – from IT to apparel to coconuts!

The SDGs and Sustainable Procurement: Making the Connection

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