Int. J.

Production Economics 140 (2012) 256–268

Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect

Int. J. Production Economics

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijpe

The relationship between sustainable procurement and e-procurement in the

public sector
Helen Walker a,n, Stephen Brammer b,1
a
Logistics and Operations Management Section, Cardiff Business School, Cardiff University, Colum Drive, Cardiff CF10 3EU, UK
b
Warwick Business School, University of Warwick, Coventry CV4 7AL, UK

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: This study examines the relationship between sustainable procurement and e-procurement, two recent
Received 24 September 2010 initiatives in public procurement in many countries. A survey of sustainable procurement and
Accepted 14 January 2012 e-procurement adoption was conducted with a sample of over 280 public procurement practitioners
Available online 25 January 2012
from 20 countries and with collective responsibility for expenditure totalling $45 BN. Using multiple
Keywords: regression, we develop a model to show that e-procurement and communication with suppliers
E-procurement supports some types of sustainable procurement, and hinders others. E-procurement and communica-
Environmental issues tion with suppliers may help environmental, labour, health and safety aspects of sustainable
Public sector procurement. Conversely, e-procurement may hinder buying from small local firms that are not
Survey
e-enabled.
Sustainable procurement
& 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Supplier communication
Information technology

1. Introduction in the following:

There is increasing concern with sustainable development and
the impact of businesses on society and the environment. This is
apparent from trends in the media, business practices and aca-
demic literature. In an analysis of top US newspapers and network
evening newscasts, it was found that media coverage on climate
change has increased seven-fold since the 1980s, peaking with
political discussions of the role of governments and businesses in
sustainability such as the Rio Summit and the Kyoto protocol
(Boykoff and Boykoff, 2007). This increased interest in sustain-
ability is reflected by the emergence in 1999 of the Dow Jones
Sustainability Indexes (2008), and in 2001 of the FTSE4Good Index
Series (FTSE, 2008), which indicate that investors and companies
are keen to demonstrate sustainability and corporate social
responsibility (CSR) and reduce impacts on the environment. This
focus on sustainability is echoed in the academic management
literature, with the number of articles on sustainability increasing
year on year (Linton et al., 2007; Srivastava, 2007).
Several journals have devoted special issues to sustainability
and CSR in the supply chain. Special issues have appeared
n
Corresponding author. Tel.: þ44 2920 876083/44 2920 874271;
fax: þ 44 2920 874419.
E-mail addresses: WalkerHL@cardiff.ac.uk (H. Walker),
Stephen.Brammer@wbs.ac.uk (S. Brammer).
1
Tel.: þ44 24 7652 4541; fax: þ44 24 7652 3719.
 Journal of Operations Management entitled ‘Supply chain
management in a sustainable environment’ (Jayaraman et al.,
2007),
 Supply Chain Management: an International Journal entitled
‘Corporate Social Responsibility in the Supply Chain’
(Lindgreen et al., 2008),
 Journal of Supply Chain Management entitled ‘Sustainable
supply chain management’ (Krause et al., 2009),
 Industrial Marketing Management has a call for papers (2011)
entitled ‘Green marketing and its impact on supply chain
management in industrial markets’,
 International Journal of Production Economics has two calls for
papers (2011) entitled ‘Models for Compassionate Operations’
and ‘Sustainable Development of Manufacturing and Services’,
 International Journal of Physical Distribution and Logistics
Management has a call for papers (2011) entitled ‘Logistics
and supply chain solutions for a changing competitive land-
scape: impacts of sustainability and resource scarcity’.
These special issues and calls for papers suggest there is a lot
of research interest in sustainable SCM, with the overwhelming
majority of studies focusing on environmental issues in private
sector manufacturing supply chain contexts (Frota Neto et al.,
2008; Piplani et al., 2008; Srivastava, 2007; Vachon and Klassen,
2008b; Zhu et al., 2008). Relatively few articles have investigated
sustainable supply chain issues in a public sector context

0925-5273/$ - see front matter & 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.ijpe.2012.01.008
 H. Walker, S. Brammer / Int. J. Production Economics 140 (2012) 256–268
(Mitra and Webster, 2008), which presents an interesting setting
due to the magnitude of public sector purchasing power, provid-
ing the potential to make substantial contributions to the sustain-
able development agenda. Our research addresses this gap by
conducting an international study of sustainable supply chain
issues in the public sector.
In the public sector, the pursuit of sustainability objectives in
the purchasing and supply process has been termed sustainable
procurement (SP). We define sustainable procurement as the
pursuit of sustainable development objectives through the
purchasing and supply process, incorporating social, environmental
and economic aspects. Sustainable procurement policy and national
plans have been developed in many countries including the UK
(DEFRA, 2007), countries in the EU (Bouwer et al., 2006; Steurer
et al., 2007) and the US (McCrudden, 2004).
Academic interest in public sector expenditure attributable to
purchases of goods and services (Brulhart and Trionfetti, 2004;
Fernandez-Martin, 1996; McCrudden, 2004; Trionfetti, 2000) arises
in part from the absolute scale of public procurement with between
8% and 25% of the GDP of OECD countries and 16% of EU GDP being
attributable to government purchases of goods or services (Afonso
et al., 2005; European Commission, 2006; OECD, 2000).
The role of government purchases as a stimulus for sustainable
development has been a topic of particular interest in recent years
(McCrudden, 2004; Walker and Brammer, 2009; Weiss and
Thurbon, 2006). As the public sector is concerned with societal
well being, it may have a propensity for pursuing sustainability
issues compared to the private sector. The government can lead
the way in stimulating sustainable supply chain management in
markets, by demanding environmentally and socially responsible
products and services of suppliers, who in turn are likely to offer
them to other customers in the market. Although sustainable
procurement has an increasingly high profile in policy circles
around the world, very little is known about the extent to which
sustainable procurement policies and practices are embedded
within the practice of public procurement professionals globally.
This study focuses particularly on the relationships between
sustainable procurement, supplier communication and e-procure-
ment. Previous studies have identified that communicating and
collaborating with suppliers can aid environmental supply chain
management, although such studies have tended to be conducted
in manufacturing contexts (Sharfman et al., 2007; Vachon and
Klassen, 2006, 2008a; Verghese and Lewis, 2007). Governments
actively promote e-business campaigns to get firms ‘connected’
(Currie, 2004). E-procurement has rarely been investigated in a
public sector context (Panayiotou et al., 2004; Schoenherr and
Rao Tummala, 2007), and in the public domain can be seen as the
use of ICT to support the delivery of public procurement policy,
improving transparency and efficiency (Carayannis and Popescu,
2005). E-procurement offers a range of new opportunities to
make sustainable purchasing operational for public sector orga-
nisations (Abukhader and Jonson, 2004; Legarth, 2001).
This study makes several contributions. First, the relationships
between the adoption of e-procurement practices, communica-
tion with suppliers and sustainable procurement have barely
been explored. Two procurement objectives are at play, these
being sustainable procurement to minimise environmental
impacts and increase social impacts, and e-procurement adoption
to achieve greater efficiency and transparency in procurement.
We shed light on the relationship and likely congruence between
these two important procurement objectives, with a view to
informing procurement policy and practice. Specifically, we seek
to identify whether e-procurement helps to operationalise sus-
tainable procurement.
Second, the extant literature on sustainable supply chain
management and on e-business has focused mainly on private
257
manufacturing sector contexts (Srivastava, 2007), whereas this
study focuses on the public sector. Management research has
often been motivated by a desire to provide firms with an
economic benefit, and similar research could be directed at non-
profit, governmental and international agencies with social mea-
sures (Prasad and Babbar, 2000). The public sector is concerned
with achieving value for money in the way it procures goods and
services, but has other policy objectives as well. What may be
good practice in a profit-making firm may not be so clearly
applicable for not-for-profit and public sector organisations. The
interaction between sustainable supply chain management and
government policy has previously been highlighted (Linton et al.,
2007):
‘‘Changes in policy y force both manufacturers and research-
ers to explore options to improve the sustainability of opera-
tions across the supply chain. However, change can also flow
in the opposite direction. Research and practice in supply
chain management can affect policy y by presenting alter-
native scenarios for the development of sustainable supply
chains’’.
This research explores how sustainable procurement interacts
with e-procurement adoption, responding to calls to investigate
practice in sustainable supply chain management in different
countries (Angell and Klassen, 1999; Zhu and Sarkis, 2004).
This paper is structured as follows. A literature review follows,
that culminates in hypothesis development. Next, the methods
are described, including sampling, dependent, independent and
control variables. The results of the analysis are then presented,
followed by a discussion and conclusions. The implications of the
study for policymakers, practitioners and future research are
considered.
2. Literature review
This section reviews literature on sustainable procurement,
communication in the supply chain and e-procurement, leading
to the formulation of hypotheses that are subsequently tested.
2.1. Sustainable procurement in the public sector
Compared to the large number of studies investigating envir-
onmental and sustainable supply chain management in the
private sector, there have been relatively few studies of sustain-
able procurement conducted in the public sector. These studies
are summarised in Table 1 and outlined below. The papers tend to
focus on tools to assist buyers, incorporating green criteria into
contracts and reviews of sustainable procurement policy.
It is possible to make some observations about existing studies
of sustainable public procurement through descriptive analysis of
the articles. First, compared to around the vast majority of studies
of sustainable supply chain management conducted in the private
sector there are markedly fewer studies in the public sector (32).
Earlier studies tended to focus on environmental issues (18),
whereas more recent studies have encompassed social, economic
and environmental issues (15). The majority of studies report case
studies (14), with surveys (5) conducted more recently, and other
studies collecting data through interviews (5), policy analysis
(3) and analysis of procurement documents (2). Most studies have
been conducted in the UK (13), followed by studies in the US (6)
and multiple country studies (3). The products and services
procured that the studies focus upon have tended to be multiple
(15), with some studies also focusing on food (5), construction
(3) and IT (2). Only 7 of the studies have adopted a theoretical
framework as a lens to view sustainable public procurement, and
 258
Table 1
Studies of sustainable public procurement.

(Author, year) Aspect of SP Sample Product/service Theories/models Part of public sector Country Major findings

(Murray, 2000) Environmental, Case study, N¼ 1 Multiple None Local government UK Green purchasing strategy adopted by Belfast City
economic Council
(Warner and Ryall, Environmental Survey, N¼ 410 Multiple None Local government UK Local authorities are experiencing difficulties with
2001) implementation and maintenance of greener
purchasing policies
(New et al., 2002) Environmental Unspecified Unspecified None Unspecified Multiple Compares public and private sector responses to
green supply
(Kunzlik, 2003) Environmental None, case law N/A None N/A Finland How green contract criteria have been accepted in
analysis public procurement contracts
(Coggburn, 2004) Environmental Policy analysis N/A None N/A US Green procurement as a policy tool in the context of
public administration

H. Walker, S. Brammer / Int. J. Production Economics 140 (2012) 256–268

(Matthews and Environmental Case studies, N ¼3 IT None Local government US Whole life considerations in IT procurement
Axelrod, 2004)
(McCrudden, 2004) Environmental, Policy analysis Multiple None Multiple Multiple Considers how governments currently attempt to
social, economic use contracts to produce desired social policy
outcomes through public procurement
(Li and Geiser, Environmental Unspecified number IT None State government US Environmentally responsible public procurement is
2005) of interviews and a key component for an integrated product policy. It
other data collection is a driving force to integrate other IPP instruments
methods such as extended producer responsibility and
ecolabeling
(Swanson et al., Environmental Case study, N¼ 1 Multiple None State government US Developed a priority-setting tool which considers
2005) purchase volume, environmental impacts, potential
for improvement, and institutional factors such as
existing state policies and upcoming contract
renewals
(Günther and Environmental Case studies to Multiple None Local government Germany Develop a self-evaluation tool to aid municipalities
Scheibe, 2005, develop tool in identifying, analysing and overcoming hurdles to
2006) green procurement
(Hall and Purchase, Environmental Survey, N¼ 143 Construction None Housing Associations UK Sustainability activities are lagging in construction
2006)
(Rimmington et al., Environmental, Multiple methods Food None Unspecified UK Develop principles of sustainable food procurement
2006) social, economic and key performance indicators to measure progress
in putting them into practice
(Dawson and Environmental Interviews, N ¼20 Compost waste None Central government UK Sustainable procurement initiatives could be used to
Probert, 2007) facilitate the inclusion of green waste compost in
contract specifications and hence enable public
bodies to close the recycling loop
(Preuss, 2007) Social, Case studies, N ¼16 Multiple None Local government UK A wide range of activities identified covering
environmental, environmental, social and economic development
economic aspects. Initiatives are still patchy
(Steurer et al., Environmental Case studies, N ¼27 Multiple None Multiple EU Examined the state of development of national
2007) action plans regarding green or sustainable public
procurement in the EU
(Thomson and Environmental Case studies, N ¼5 Multiple None Local government UK Green procurement has been encouraged through
Jackson, 2007) legislation, providing information and dismantling
barriers, but momentum was lost following the
Gershon review
(Bala et al., 2008) Environmental, fair Case studies, N ¼5 Office material, Integrated chain Education Spain The focal position of the university as a consumer
trade, recycled toner management and the actions carried out are necessary to move
cartridges, fair trade framework (Seuring, the supply chain towards more environmentally
coffee, reusable glass 2004) friendly practices
bottles and catering
services
(Bolton, 2008) Environmental, social Case study, N¼ 1 Multiple None Multiple South Africa The focus is on South Africa and the aim is to show
that South African organs of state can use
procurement as an environmental policy tool to
contribute to sustainable development as they have
commendably done so to address past
discriminatory policies and practices
(Geng and Environmental Case study, N¼ 1 Multiple None Central government China Due to lack of guidelines and lower environmental
Doberstein, awareness, China is still in its infancy in terms of
2008) promoting green procurement
(Walker and Environmental, social Interviews with Food and None Local government UK Buying from small businesses can make
Preuss, 2008) purchasing managers environmental and health contributions in a variety of forms, ranging from a
from 6 local regeneration contribution to local economic development
government and consultancy services through providing innovative green products and
5 NHS organisations services, to helping the public sector organisation to
better align its operations with its community

H. Walker, S. Brammer / Int. J. Production Economics 140 (2012) 256–268

(Preuss, 2009) Social, economic, Case studies, N ¼16 Multiple Funnel model (Voss, Local government UK Local government procurers have adopted a wide
environmental 2002) range of initiatives to address all three aspects of
sustainability. These are condensed into a typology
of sustainable supply chain management for the
public sector.
(Sonnino, 2009) Social, economic, Interviews, N ¼12, Food None Local government Italy Procurement policies have the power to create an
environmental and documentary ‘economy of quality’ that can deliver the economic,
sources environmental, and social benefits of sustainable
development
(Walker and Environment, Survey, N¼ 106 Multiple Adapted public General public UK Variation across public sector in the nature of SP
Brammer, 2009) diversity, human procurement services, health, practice. Local authorities emphasis buying from
rights, philanthropy, compliance model education, justice and SMEs, health lower in many categories, and
and safety, small (Gelderman et al., public order, other education emphasises environmentalCost is leading
businesses 2006) sectors barrier and top management support is leading
facilitator
(Ho et al., 2010) Environmental Case studies, N ¼6 Multiple None Multiple Asia This paper reviews the procurement practices and
policies of five Asian countries and Hong Kong, in
the context of an international overview of green
purchasing and practices
(Molenaar et al., Environmental Content analysis of Construction None Unspecified US The findings show that owners are missing
2010) 26 procurement opportunities to evaluate design-builders on
documents sustainable building experience and sustainability of
the proposed design in project management plans
(Smith and Minority owned Contract award data Unspecified Theory of Federal agencies US Federal agencies with more demographically
Fernandez, 2010) businesses for federal agencies, representative representative leadership award a larger percentage
N¼ 60 bureaucracy of contracts to small disadvantaged businesses
(Kingsley, 1944)
(Willis, 2010) Environmental, Policy analysis Road construction, None Unspecified UK Uses cost–benefit analysis to evaluate a variety of
social, economic video conferencing, sustainable procurement policies. It shows under
LED traffic lights, and what conditions sustainable procurement is likely to
utilising unemployed benefit the economy and society
people
(Brammer and Environment, Survey, N¼ 283 Multiple Adapted public General public Multiple The extent and nature of SP practices varies
Walker, 2011) diversity, human procurement services, health, significantly across regions
rights, philanthropy, compliance model education, justice and
and safety, small (Gelderman et al., public order, other
businesses 2006) sectors
(Meehan and Social, Survey, N¼ 44 Social housing Organisational inertia Housing associations UK Found a failure to overcome inertia in relation to
Bryde, 2011) environmental, provision (Miller and Friesen, sustainable procurement; and in the few examples
economic 1980) where practices have been established, only the
environmental element

259
260 H. Walker, S. Brammer / Int. J. Production Economics 140 (2012) 256–268

all of those studies have been since 2008. There is clearly a need for

combination of individual, group and organisational

critical processes of the window life cycle, giving a

theory development and testing to enhance how sustainable

LCA allowed to identify the main impacts and the

including all of the levels of government, market

scientific framework to discuss GPP criteria with

mechanisms, direct and indirect consumers and
procurement is conceptualised and understood.
Sustainable partnership governance works to

manufacturers associations and stakeholders

The article highlights how progress towards
institutionalise cooperation between actors,
It is possible to characterise different approaches to sustain-

sustainable procurement is hampered by a

able procurement in different countries. A recent study examined
the state of development of national action plans regarding green
or sustainable public procurement in the EU (Steurer et al., 2007).
Of the 27 EU member states, their analysis showed that only a
third of governments had adopted an action plan concerning
sustainable public procurement by April 2007. The emphasis of
much of the policy that has been implemented in the EU is
environmental rather than social in character.
Major findings

In contrast, sustainable procurement policy frameworks in the

producers

United States have, consistent with the constitution, a particular

factors

emphasis on avoiding discrimination and providing equal oppor-

tunites (McCrudden, 2004). For the United States, these issues
have most clearly been crystallised in the development of federal
policies that promote procurement from women and minority
owned businesses with some emphasis on purchasing from
Country

indigenous peoples. The focus on issues of discrimination also

Brazil

Italy
UK

played an important role in shaping US government policies in

respect of purchases from overseas in that procurement (or non-
procurement) from Northern Ireland and South Africa were used
Part of public sector

as a lever to place pressure on the UK government to stop

Local government

Local government

religious discrimination, and upon the South African government

to end apartheid (McCrudden, 2004). This broadening conceptua-
and health
Education

lisation from an environmental supply chain focus to sustainable

supply chain management, incorporating social, environmental
and economic elements is apparent in trends in both public policy
and private sector research (DEFRA, 2007; Matos and Hall, 2007;
McCrudden, 2004; Quak and de Koster, 2007).
Work psychology
Theories/models

In sum, it is apparent that sustainable procurement research

theory (Argyris,

has been somewhat limited to date in the public sector. Sustain-

able procurement in its various guises is a policy objective in
public procurement in an increasing number of countries, but
1957)
None

None

there has been no investigation to date of how policy is being put

into practice. This study aims to address this research gap.
Product/service

School meals

2.2. Communication in supply chains

Windows
Multiple

One of the themes to arise from private sector research is that

progress in sustainable supply chain management depends on
communication and collaboration with suppliers. A variety of
studies have looked at sustainable supply from a collaborative
Interviews, N ¼72
Case study, N¼ 1

Case study, N¼ 1

paradigm, emphasising the need to communicate, integrate and

collaborate with suppliers in pursuit of sustainaibilty (Forman
and Sogaard, 2004; Seuring and Müller, 2007; Vachon and
Sample

Klassen, 2006, 2008a; Vachon and Klassen, 2007; Verghese and

Lewis, 2007). One study found that the extent that firms engage in
cooperative supply chain environmental management is affected
by inter-firm trust (Sharfman et al., 2007). A study of environ-
mental requirements in road maintenance contracts in Sweden
social, economic
Environmental,
Environmental

Environmental

emphasises the importance of actively involving, informing and

Aspect of SP

training all relevant parties (Faith-Ell, 2005). Another study

examines how relations between customers and suppliers affect
environmental performance as indicated by waste reduction in
chemical firms (Theyel, 2001), finding evidence of reciprocal
learning.
Table 1 (continued )

In this study we investigate how sustainable procurement is

Walker, 2011)

(Tarantini et al.,
(Otsuki, 2011)
(Author, year)

affected by the extent of communication with suppliers. In order

(Preuss and

to capture this aspect of supply relationships, we draw on survey

2011)

items from a study of strategic supply that investigates commu-

nication and relationships in the supply chain (Chen et al., 2004),
discussed in more detail in the method section. We propose the
 H. Walker, S. Brammer / Int. J. Production Economics 140 (2012) 256–268
following hypothesis:
H1. Greater communication between buyers and suppliers will
facilitate the sustainable procurement by enhancing information
exchange, collaboration and hence the ability of buyers to imple-
ment sustainable procurement policies in their supply relationships.
2.3. E-procurement in the public sector
E-business and business-to business (B2B) technologies are
characterised by ‘‘the use of the Internet or any digitally enabled
inter or intra-organisational information technology to accom-
plish business processes’’ (Boone and Ganeshan, 2004). E-business
entails creating information systems that link suppliers, manu-
facturers, logistics companies, financial services, marketing and
other functions, so that organisations can add value and to control
costs, thereby making it possible to operate with smaller invest-
ments in physical assets (Jin and Robey, 2008). The scope of
e-business includes information exchange, commercial transac-
tions and knowledge sharing between organisations (Croom,
2005), whereas e-commerce focuses only on commercial transac-
tions (Cullen and Webster, 2007). Some of the technologies
associated with e-commerce include websites, e-mail, extranets,
intranets and electronic data interchange (EDI) (Mclvor and
Humphreys, 2004).
E-procurement is a form of e-business with upstream suppli-
ers (Rosenweig and Roth, 2007), and has been described as ‘‘the
automation of the procurement process’’ (Vaidyanathan and
Devaraj, 2008), allowing companies in supply chains to use the
Internet for procuring goods and services (Pollock and Williams,
2009). E-procurement has also been described as the use of
information technologies to facilitate business-to-business (B2B)
purchase transactions for materials and services (Wu, Zsidisin and
Ross, 2007). E-procurement utilises electronic commerce tech-
nologies to identify potential suppliers of goods and services, to
interact with suppliers in e-marketplaces and to transfer pay-
ments (Min and Galle, 2003; Standing et al., 2007).
E-procurement can assist governments in the way they do
business by reducing transaction costs, preventing maverick
buying, making better decisions and getting more value
(Panayiotou et al., 2004). Since Autumn 2002 in the EU there
have been significant developments in e-procurement, and legis-
lative changes have encouraged greater use. One of the aims of
the Consolidated Directive (2004/18/EC) is to give a supportive
policy approach to e-procurement adoption across the member
states (EUROPA, 2004).
A number of European countries have developed and imple-
mented solutions for public e-procurement at a national level,
summarised in Table 2.
A few studies have explored aspects of environmental supply
and e-business. E-commerce is expected to influence a wide range
Table 2
Examples of government e-business portals.
Country E-business
Austria e-procurement
Australia e-procurement
Belgium e-sourcing
Canada e-procurement
Denmark e-procurement
France e-auction
Ireland e-sourcing
Italy e-auction
US e-procurement
261
of supply chain systems and thus lead to positive environmental
impacts (Abukhader and Jonson, 2004). The internet offers new
opportunities to make environmental purchasing operational.
Benefits include global system access, no paper handling, ease
of operation for procurement staff and a uniform and transparent
treatment of suppliers (Legarth, 2001). Links have been made
between the adoption of enterprise resource planning and waste
reduction (Bendoly and Schoenherr, 2005).
In this study we investigate how sustainable procurement is
affected by the degree to which information and communication
technologies are implemented in the supply chain. In order to
capture these aspects of sustainability and e-procurement, we
draw on a study of information systems theory and practice in the
purchasing function and their impact on purchasing performance
(Hemsworth et al., 2005), discussed in more detail in the method
section. We propose the following hypothesis.
H2: Greater use of e-procurement facilitates sustainable pro-
curement by offering new ways to operationalise sustainable
procurement.
The literature review above has led to two hypotheses, which
were tested empirically using a sample of public procurement
practitioners from over 20 countries, as outlined in the next section.
3. Research methodology
3.1. Sampling issues
Since there is no global database of public procurement
professionals, our sampling strategy employed began from a wide
list of contacts in public procurement around the world encoun-
tered in our earlier research. We made an initial approach to each
contact asking them if they would be willing to forward our
survey throughout their professional network including contacts
they had in other countries and asking their contacts to do
similarly where they were willing. This ‘‘snowballing’’ sampling
strategy is relatively commonly used in contexts, such as ours,
that are characterised by there being relatively small numbers of
appropriate respondents who are members of well developed
professional groups (Kalton and Anderson, 1986). With the sup-
port of these contacts, we directly e-mailed our survey instru-
ment to over 1000 public procurement professionals in 25
countries. Given that we cannot be absolutely sure how many
purchasing professionals our survey ultimately reached, it is
difficult to be precise regarding the final rate of response.
However, after conducting some follow-up analysis we estimate
that the 283 responses drawn from 20 countries that we ulti-
mately received represents an overall response rate in the region
of 18%.
Table 3 provides a detailed description of our sample. Panel A
describes the distribution of the sample across regions. A little
Name Website
E-Shop www.e-shop.gv.at
e-portals www.agimo.gov.au
www.tenders.gov.au/
Joint Electronic Public Procurement www.jepp.be
Government Electronic Tendering Service http://gocm.gc.ca/
Government of Canada Marketplace
Danish Public Procurement Portal www.doip.dk
Ixarm portal achatpublic www.ixarm.com
Supplier Registration and Opportunities website www.etenders.gov.ie
Acquisti in Rete della Pubblica Amministrazione www.acquistinretepa.it
(The Office of Federal Procurement Policy Act, 2006) www.acquisition.gov
262 H. Walker, S. Brammer / Int. J. Production Economics 140 (2012) 256–268

Table 3
Sample characteristics and descriptive statistics.

United Kingdom Western Europe Eastern Europe Scandinavia United States/Canada Rest of the world All countries

Panel A—Geographic composition of sample

Number of organisations 106 49 36 29 52 11 283
Percentage of sample 37.5% 17.3% 12.7% 10.2% 18.4% 3.9% 100.0%

Panel B—Sectoral composition of sample

General public services 38.7% 35.4% 16.7% 51.7% 46.2% 36.4% 37.9%
Health 26.4% 10.4% 16.7% 3.4% 0.0% 0.0% 14.2%
Education 19.8% 8.3% 38.9% 17.2% 23.1% 0.0% 19.9%
Justice and Public order 8.5% 0.0% 2.8% 0.0% 3.8% 0.0% 4.3%
Other sectors 6.6% 46.9% 25.0% 27.6% 26.9% 63.6% 24.6%
Total 100.0% 100.0% 100.0% 100.0% 100.0% 100.0% 100.0%

Panel C—Descriptive statistics for numbers of suppliers and contract length

Average contract length (years) 3.5 2.4 1.4 3.2 3.2 2.3 2.9
Average no. of suppliers 3726 1603 740 1558 7107 17,545 3898

In the last 10 years, our total number of suppliers has:

Stayed the same 28.3% 31.9% 25.7% 34.5% 31.9% 20.0% 29.6%
Reduced 42.4% 27.7% 11.4% 24.1% 14.9% 40.0% 28.8%
Increased 29.3% 40.4% 62.9% 41.4% 53.2% 40.0% 41.6%
% change up or down 18.3 5.0 44.7 44.0 24.1  11.0 21.9

Panel D—Descriptive statistics for expenditure and supplier concentration

Average expenditure (£M) 238.3 165.2 3.0 47.3 157.8 136.0 156.8
% Spend with top 3 suppliers 21.6 23.6 39.2 23.8 17.8 36.5 24.9

more than a third of the sample comes from the UK with the
remainder of the sample comprising significant sub-samples of
organisations from the United States/Canada (18.4% of the sample),
Western Europe (17.3%), Eastern Europe (12.7%) and Scandinavia
(10.2%). A small group of observations came from the rest of the
world. We grouped the sample into regions rather than individual
countries to reflect the different policy contexts of the regions, and
to ensure we had sufficient observations of each sub-sample for
analysis.
Panel B describes the sectoral composition of the sample, again
broken down by country. General public service providers, typi-
cally local authorities or regional governments, make up the
largest sub-sample of organisations in our sample, with bodies
involved with education and healthcare also strongly represented.
It is apparent that there is some variation in the composition of
the sample across countries with comparatively few organisations
involved in ‘‘other’’ aspects of the public sector in the UK, and
relatively more in the Western European sub-sample.
Concerning the extent to which our sample is representative of
global public sector organisations, it is clear that we over-sample
UK-based organisations and under-sample those from the rest of
the world. Regarding the sectoral composition of the sample, our
sample draws on the full breadth of public sector activity with
significant sub-samples of organisations involved in healthcare,
education, public order and justice, transport, and the provision of
general public services. Hence, while not overall strictly repre-
sentative, our sample is certainly inclusive of the breadth of
organisations comprising the global public sector and should,
therefore, provide a good basis for establishing the depth and
breadth of engagement with SP practice. Furthermore, the total
spending of sample organisations is approximately £45 BN. For
the UK sub-sample, this represents about 17% of the estimated
procurement spend of the public sector of £150 BN (DEFRA, 2006)
and roughly 10% of the public sector’s annually managed expen-
diture (which was £249.5 BN in 2005/6).
The remainder of Table 3 provides sample descriptive statistics
for a range of other variables that collectively characterise the
procurement climate. These figures show, for example, that the
average organisation in our sample had about 4000 active
suppliers, that the average contract lasted approximately 3 years,
that the largest 3 suppliers typically account for around 22% of an
organisation’s spending, and that 40% of our sample organisations
had a wider supplier base than they had 10 years ago.
3.2. Dependent variables
Our dependent variables reflect the extent to which sustainabil-
ity criterion are embedded in public procurement practice. In order
to capture this, we took as our starting point Carter and Jennings’
(2004) purchasing social responsibility (PSR) scale items (Carter and
Jennings, 2004). Carter and Jennings (2004) develop a scale consist-
ing of 14 items that relate to five dimensions of sustainable
procurement: the natural environment, diversity, human rights,
philanthropy and employee safety. Their factor analysis, based on
a sample of 201 US consumer product manufacturers, demonstrated
that these 12 of these 14 items can be reduced to a single factor
(which they term purchasing social responsibility) that has a high
degree of overall reliability and validity.
Given that our research is focused on public sector organisa-
tions, we first asked an expert panel of ten senior public procure-
ment professionals to review our survey instrument. The expert
panel consisted of senior public procurement practitioners (Senior
Manager or Director level) from the health sector, local govern-
ment and central government, who had all been in senior
procurement posts for at least 10 years. All members of the expert
panel had implemented best practice examples of sustainable
procurement, and sat on sustainable procurement policy commit-
tees. The expert panel completed the questionnaire and reviewed
the survey items to ensure their face validity and efficacy.
At the panel’s suggestion, and in order to reflect the breadth of
the concept of sustainability as applied to the context of public
procurement, we added two items that explored the importance
of buying from small and local suppliers. Hence, we eventually
elicited responses from sample organisations concerning the
degree to which 16 sustainability practices were embedded in
their current procurement practice. A list of survey items is
included in Table 4.
Consistent with best practice, our next step was to conduct an
exploratory factor analysis of the 16 items using the maximum
likelihood method with varimax rotation (Hair et al., 1998; Kim
and Mueller, 1978). A total of four factors were identified with
eigenvalues greater than unity, this being the most commonly
 H. Walker, S. Brammer / Int. J. Production Economics 140 (2012) 256–268
Table 4
Survey items.
Authors Survey items
Carter and Purchasing social responsibility
Jennings (2004) Currently, our purchasing function:
Environmental purchasing
Uses a life-cycle analysis to evaluate the environmental
friendliness of products and packaging
Participates in the design of products for disassembly
Asks suppliers to commit to waste reduction goals
Participates in the design of products for recycling or
reuse
Reduces packaging material
Diversity
Purchases from minority/women-owned business
enterprise (MWBE) suppliers
Has a formal MWBE supplier purchase programme
Human rights
Visits suppliers’ plants to ensure that they are not using
sweatshop labour
Ensures that suppliers comply with child labour laws
Asks suppliers to pay a ‘living wage’ greater than a
country’s or region’s minimum wage
Philanthropy
Volunteers at local charities
Donates to philanthropic organisations
Safety
Ensures that suppliers’ locations are operated in a safe
manner
Ensures the safe, incoming movement of product to our
facilities
We added two additional items:
Purchases from small suppliers (o 250 employees)
Purchases from local suppliers
Chen et al. (2004) Communication
We share sensitive information (financial, production,
design, research, and/or competition)
Suppliers are provided with any information that might
help them
Exchange of information takes place frequently,
informally and/or in a timely manner
We keep each other informed about events or changes
that may affect the other party
We have frequent face-to-face planning/communication
with suppliers
We exchange performance feedback with suppliers
Hemsworth et al. E-procurement—purchasing-related information systems
(2005) We use electronic data interchange (EDI) with suppliers
We use the internet with suppliers
We use computers to process orders to suppliers
Table 5
Factor analysis results.
Aspect of sustainable procurement
Uses a life-cycle analysis to evaluate the environmental friendliness of products and packaging
Has a formal MWBE supplier purchase programme
Participates in the design of products for recycling or reuse
Ensures the safe, incoming movement of product to our facilities
Purchases from MWBE suppliers
Volunteers at local charities
Asks suppliers to commit to waste reduction goals
Purchases from small suppliers
Visits suppliers’ plants to ensure that they are not using sweatshop labour
Participates in the design of products for disassembly
Asks suppliers to pay a ‘living wage’ greater than a country’s or region’s minimum wage
Donates to philanthropic organisations
Ensures that suppliers’ locations are operated in a safe manner
Ensures that suppliers comply with child labour laws
Purchases from local suppliers
Reduces packaging material
Eigenvalue
% of variance explained
Factor solutions obtained by principal component analysis using varimax rotation with Kaiser normalisation. Individual factor loadings less than 0.5 in absolute value are
suppressed for clarity.
263
applied threshold for retention of a factor (Rietveld and Van Hout,
1993; Hair et al., 1998). Hair et al. (1998) suggest that factor
loadings on individual items greater than 0.5 in absolute value
should be viewed as being of ‘‘practical significance’’ in the
interpretation of a given factor. With this in mind, Table 5 provides
a detailed description of the factor loadings across the 16 indivi-
dual items for the four retained factors. The detailed inspection of
the factor loadings provided in Table 5 suggests that the 6 items
that load most heavily onto the first factor relate to environmental
improvements in the supply chain and to compliance in the
domain of employee health and safety. In reflection of this, we
name this factor ENVLAB. The second factor is comprised most
heavily of four items, two of which relate to community aspects of
sustainability, one of which relates to environmental improve-
ments and one of which concerns labour rights. In light of the
heavier loadings on the community items, we name this factor
COMMUNITY. The final two factors (named DIVERSITY and SME-
LOCAL) are more easily interpreted in that they each reflects only
two underlying items that relate, respectively, to procurement
from minority and women-owned businesses and to purchasing
from small and local businesses.
3.3. Independent variables
Reflecting the conceptual discussion above, our key indepen-
dent variables relate to the extent of communication within the
supply relationship and the degree to which information tech-
nologies such as e-procurement are implemented in supply
management. In order to capture these aspects of supply relation-
ships, we drew on a study of strategic supply that investigated
communication and relationships in the supply chain (Chen et al.,
2004) and a study of information systems theory and practice in
the purchasing function and their impact on purchasing perfor-
mance (Hemsworth et al., 2005).
Concerning communication within the supply chain, we drew
upon a scale developed by Chen et al. (2004) which was demon-
strated to have excellent validity and reliability. Communication
in this context relates to ‘‘the extent to which the firm and its key
suppliers: (a) share critical, sensitive information related to
operational and strategic issues; (b) exchange such information
frequently, informally and/or in a timely manner; (c) maintain
frequent face-to-face meetings and (d) closely monitor and
stay abreast of events or changes that may affect both parties’’
Factor 1 Factor 2 Factor 3 Factor 4
0.63
0.89
0.55
0.86
0.69
0.72
0.82
0.58
0.65
0.69
0.56
0.54
0.80
0.79
4.91 2.08 1.58 1.06
30.69 13.01 9.88 6.63
264 H. Walker, S. Brammer / Int. J. Production Economics 140 (2012) 256–268

(Chen et al., 2004, 513). Our starting point was the 6 items

 0.389
comprising Chen et al.’s (2004) supplier communication scale,

(14)
each of which was measured using a 5-point Likert scale, ranging

–
from ‘disagree strongly’ (scored 1) to ‘agree strongly’ (scored 5).

 0.318
 0.202
Our expert panel checked the applicability of the items to the

(13)
public sector context and all items were deemed to apply to

–
public sector organisations. In order to check the validity of the
construct in our context, we calculated Cronbach’s alpha coeffi-

 0.082
 0.100
 0.007
cient for the 6 items which, at 0.778, suggests that this construct

(12)
translates well to the public sector context. Subsequently, we

–
generated the single construct, COMMUNICATION, from these

 0.193
 0.095
items using factor analysis.

0.038
0.080
(11)
To explore the relationship between the use of information

–
technologies in procurement and sustainable procurement, we

 0.159
 0.067
 0.104
 0.022
used a scale developed by Hemsworth et al. (2005). Their scale,

0.096
(10)
termed ‘‘purchasing-related information systems’’ relates to three

–
groups of information systems that relate to purchasing that were
identified by Sriram et al. (1997). Specifically, purchasing-related

 0.128

 0.168
 0.180
 0.076

0.182
0.027
information systems comprise ‘‘(1) base systems and support

(9)

–
(hardware and software); (2) vendor communications interface
(enabling technology); and (3) purchasing-specific applications/

 0.173
 0.153
 0.215

 0.131
 0.091
 0.049

 0.024
practices utilising the technology’’ (Hemsworth et al., 2005, 174).

(8)
Our starting point is the five items suggested by Hemsworth et al.,

–
(2005) which their study demonstrated had excellent validity and

 0.523

 0.187
 0.019

 0.027
reliability. These items were evaluated by our expert panel of

0.113
0.084
0.020

0.060
public procurers to evaluate face validity in the public sector

(7)

–
context; this process led to the rejection of two of the items,

 0.194
 0.089

 0.033
leaving us with a three item scale. A reliability analysis on these

0.077

0.037
0.044

0.102
0.046
0.020
three items in our data produced a Cronbach’s alpha of 0.592,
(6)

–
which, while lower than desired, is nevertheless indicative of a
useful underlying construct. We generated this construct, ITUSE,

 0.191

 0.144
 0.016

 0.044

 0.015
0.175
0.402
0.029

0.032

0.025
using factor analysis in the same manner as described above.
(5)

 0.162
 0.165

 0.147
 0.150
 0.050
3.4. Control variables 0.144

0.144

0.113
0.056

0.201
0.034
(4)

The propensity of an organisation to embed sustainable

procurement practices is likely to be related to a range of control  0.173

 0.148

 0.124
 0.031
 0.022

 0.064
0.432
0.026

0.052

0.086
0.020
0.000

factors. Given the wide range of regions from which our data are
(3)

drawn and the likely variation in the institutional pressures to

–

engage in sustainable procurement, we include a set of dummy

 0.081
 0.037

 0.309

variables, each taking the value of one if an organisation is from a  0.077

0.133
0.066

0.012
0.072

0.022
0.098
0.090
0.000
0.000
(2)

given region, and zero otherwise, in our analysis. Furthermore, it

–

may be that larger organisations may be more able and inclined

 0.194
 0.129

 0.033

to incorporate sustainability criteria into their procurement.

0.424
0.267

0.113
0.029

0.064
0.096

0.019
0.003
0.000
0.000
0.000

In order to control for this possibility, we include an organisation’s

(1)

size, as captured by the natural logarithm of the organisation’s

total purchasing expenditure, as an additional control variable.
1.31
1.28
1.47
1.38
1.71
1.24
1.29
1.19
1.51
1.52
1.53
VIF

–
–
–
–

Finally, organisations engaged in different aspects of the public

sector may be more able to engage in sustainable procurement.
Std. deviation

In order to control for this we include a set of dummy variables

that reflect an organisation’s activity each of which takes a value
Descriptive statistics and correlation coefficients.

of one if an organisation is engaged in a given sector of the public

0.38
0.33

0.39
0.19
0.35

0.49
3.07

0.30

0.40
1.00
1.00
1.00
1.00
1.00
1.00

sector, and zero otherwise.

Mean

0.17
0.13

0.18

0.14

0.38
16.72

0.10

0.04

0.20
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00

4. Survey findings
(15) General public services
(11) United States/Canada

In this section we present the results of our regression

(12) Rest of the world

analyses. Table 6 presents descriptive statistics and a correlation

(8) Western Europe
(5) COMMUNICATE

(9) Eastern Europe

matrix for key variables. The pattern of correlation among the

(10) Scandinavia

(14) Education
(4) SMELOCAL

variables suggests that multicolinearity is unlikely to present

(2) COMMUN
(3) DIVERSE
(1) ENVLAB

(13) Health

serious statistical problems as all correlation coefficients are

(6) ITUSE
(7) SIZE

lower than 0.6. A formal test for the possible importance of

Table 6

multicolinearity through the calculation of variance inflation

factors (VIFs) confirms this as all VIFs are lower than 2 and are
 H. Walker, S. Brammer / Int. J. Production Economics 140 (2012) 256–268 265

thus well below the accepted thresholds at which multicolinear- Our findings suggest this hypothesis is supported, dependent
ity is likely to cause analytical difficulties (Hair et al., 1998). on the aspect of sustainable procurement in question. We find a
Table 7 presents the results for four regression models that strongly positive and statistically significant link between the use
differ according to the dependent variable. The first model of information technology in procurement activities and environ-
explores the influences on the propensity for organisations to mental and labour health and safety aspects of sustainable
engage in sustainable procurement focused on environmental and procurement (p ¼0.020). However, we find no evidence that
labour health and safety. Subsequent models explore the influ- e-procurement has any impact on sustainable procurement man-
ences upon the propensity for sample organisations to engage in ifested as procurement from women and minority-owned busi-
sustainable procurement practices that are focused on commu- nesses or community-oriented procurement. Interestingly, and
nity, diversity and small and local business issues, respectively. contrary to Hypothesis 2, we identify a significant negative
Our findings are summarised in Fig. 1. relationship between e-procurement practices and buying from
Our study proposed two hypotheses. The first was: small and local businesses (p ¼0.004).
Concerning the importance of our control variables for sus-
H1. Greater communication between buyers and suppliers will tainable procurement practices, we find no evidence that larger
facilitate the sustainable procurement by enhancing information public organisations participate in sustainable procurement to a
exchange, collaboration and hence the ability of buyers to imple- greater degree than smaller organisations, but do identify sig-
ment sustainable procurement policies in their supply relationships. nificant variation in SP both across countries and across public
Our evidence provides support for Hypothesis 1, dependent on sector organisations engaged in different activities. More specifi-
the aspect of sustainable procurement in question. The environ- cally, our study suggests that procurement practices that, con-
mental and health and safety aspects of sustainable procurement sistent with local legal frameworks, a focus on minority and
are significantly enhanced by greater communication between women-owned businesses in procurement is largely confined to
buyers and suppliers. There is a strongly positive and statistically the United States and Canada, and that there is a significantly
significant link between aspects of sustainable procurement that greater tendency to buy from small and local companies as part of
are oriented on environmental and labour health and safety and sustainable procurement in the UK and US/Canada relative to
procurement from small and local businesses (p¼0.000 and 0.004, other regions. Organisations engaged in the provision of general
respectively). However, we find no relationship between closer public services, such as local and regional governments, are more
supplier communication and either procurement from minority and
women-owned businesses or procurement practices undertaken
with a high degree of regard for communities (shown in brackets in
ENVLAB
Fig. 1). In the case of procurement from minority and women- .0 00)
p=0 )
owned businesses, this may be explicable by reference to the fact + ve ( .0
20
=0
that this activity primarily arises out of legislation that is specific to COMMUNICATION (p (COMMUNITY)
ve
some geographical areas, a fact that is consistent with the pattern of +v+
e
(p
(DIVERSITY)
significance identified with respect to the control variables. EPROCUREMENT = 0.
00
- ve 4)
Our second hypothesis stated that: ( p=
0 .0
0 4)
SMELOCAL
H2. Greater use of e-procurement facilitates sustainable procurement
by offering new ways to operationalise sustainable procurement. Fig. 1. Relationships between dependent and independent variables.

Table 7
Regression results.

Dependent variables

ENVLAB COMMUN DIVERSE SMELOCAL

Constant  0.421 (0.991) 0.485 (1.083)  0.108 (0.251)  0.164 (0.382)

Independent variables
COMMUNICATE 0.368 (5.718)nnn 0.035 (0.515)  0.002 (0.024) 0.191 (2.935)nnn
ITUSE 0.147 (2.350)nn 0.054 (0.826)  0.051 (0.806)  0.182 (2.871)nnn

Control variables
Size 0.025 (1.115)  0.024 (1.019) 0.006 (0.280) 0.019 (0.839)
Western Europe 0.233 (1.239)  0.162 (0.815)  0.359 (1.890)n  0.584 (3.064)nnn
Eastern Europe 0.291 (1.353) 0.087 (0.384) 0.180 (0.828)  0.629 (2.888)nnn
Scandinavia 0.313 (1.574)  1.137 (5.429)nnn  0.237 (1.182)  0.787 (3.914)nnn
United States/Canada  0.416 (2.360)nn  0.252 (1.358) 1.220 (6.857)nnn  0.178 (0.999)
Rest of the world  0.295 (0.983) 0.190 (0.600) 0.365 (1.204) 0.372 (1.224)
Health  0.100 (0.512)  0.227 (1.104)  0.152 (0.771)  0.251 (1.270)
Education 0.071 (0.408) 0.219 (1.197)  0.026 (0.150) 0.186 (1.059)
General public services  0.050 (0.338) 0.239 (1.543)  0.338 (2.281)nn 0.344 (2.315)nn

R2 0.25 0.16 0.26 0.21

Adjusted R2 0.22 0.12 0.22 0.17
N 245 245 245 245

Notes: Figures in parentheses are t-statistics (absolute values). Significance levels:

n
p o 0.10.
nn
p o0.05.
nnn
p o0.01.
266 H. Walker, S. Brammer / Int. J. Production Economics 140 (2012) 256–268
likely to engage in local/SME procurement but less likely to buy
from women and minority-owned businesses.
5. Discussion and conclusions
This study aimed to explore the extent to which sustainable
procurement policy is being put into practice and whether
different aspects of sustainable procurement are affected by the
use of e-procurement and communication with suppliers.
An international survey of public procurement professionals found
that sustainable procurement policies are being put into practice
within public sector organisations internationally, but that policy
and practice varies across countries. The findings are discussed
below, along with the implications for policy and practice.
The research explored whether public sector organisations
that have greater use of e-procurement and communicate more
with suppliers also have greater engagement in different aspects
of sustainable procurement practices (environment, labour prac-
tices, health and safety, community and philanthropic activities,
buying from minority owned SMEs, buying from SMEs and
local SMEs).
Communication with suppliers and e-procurement do not
appear to be significantly related to community and diversity
variables (community and philanthropic activities, and buying
from minority owned SMEs) (shown in brackets in Fig. 1). The
links between these social aspects of sustainable procurement
and e-procurement seem less well developed than the environ-
mental aspects, which reflects the substantially greater focus on
green procurement practices generally across countries.
Communication is positively related to environmental supply
practices and labour, health and safety. Those public sector
organisations that communicate more with suppliers may have
greater impacts on these aspects of sustainable procurement. This
finding aligns with studies suggesting that communication and
collaboration in supply chains aids environmental supply chain
management (Theyel, 2001; Vachon and Klassen, 2006).
Communication is positively related to buying from SMEs and
local suppliers. This suggests that e-procurement might need to
be supported by traditional communications to keep the SMEs
engaged. This may suggest that communication activities such as
‘Meet the Buyer’ events held by public sector organisations may
facilitate engagement with small and local suppliers. As commu-
nication is positively related to aspects of sustainable procure-
ment, there is scope for future research to extend the current
investigation to explore how different forms of e-business other
than e-procurement may support information and knowledge
exchange in sustainable supply chains.
In addition e-procurement is positively related to environ-
mental supply practices and labour, health and safety. This
affirms previous findings that link elements of e-commerce with
environmental purchasing (Bendoly and Schoenherr, 2005;
Legarth, 2001). It may be that e-procurement facilitates some
aspects of environmental purchasing, such as having green
products available in e-catalogues. E-procurement may also
increase efficiency and reduce waste in the purchasing and supply
process, making procurement ‘lean and green’ (Kainuma and
Tawara, 2006).
However, we found a strong negative relationship between
e-procurement practices and buying from small and local busi-
nesses. SMEs typically lack the capabilities to adopt e-procurement
or other types of IT, so greater use of IT in public procurement is
likely to leave some SMEs out if they cannot adapt. Previous
studies have suggested that small businesses are not ready for
e-procurement, and are hindered in supplying the public sector
compared to larger suppliers (Kartiwi and MacGregor, 2007;
Quayle, 2005). E-procurement may reflect the strategic interests
of powerful players and may be shaped by the competitive
environment (Webster, 1995). Our study seems to suggest that
e-procurement acts as an impediment to an important aspect of
sustainable procurement, namely buying from SMEs. In some cases
such as Taiwan, government programmes have been implemented
to link up small suppliers electronically. This kind of support
might be necessary to keep SMEs involved while pursuing
sustainability goals.
It has been suggested that public procurement can make
significant inroads on the sustainable procurement agenda by
buying from SMEs (Walker and Preuss, 2008). Also, it seems that
sustainable procurement practices in the UK seem to be skewed
towards buying from small and local suppliers (Walker and
Brammer, 2009). It appears that e-procurement policy and sus-
tainable procurement policy are conflicting policy objectives in
some country policy contexts.
It seems apparent that e-procurement will not help a public
sector organisation with all types of sustainable procurement
equally. It will depend on the type of purchase and the type of
sustainable procurement benefit pursued. There will be trade-offs
between different aspects of sustainable procurement, for exam-
ple, local suppliers may not be the best suppliers for reductions in
waste and packaging. It would be interesting for future research
to investigate such trade-offs, and to gain understanding of how
e-procurement can most effectively operationalise specific
aspects of sustainable procurement.
The study had several limitations. Respondents are self-select-
ing and likely to skew the sample to those practitioners having an
interest in sustainable procurement. In addition, survey items
were drawn from surveys of manufacturing organisations, which
may have limited applicability in the public sector, despite our
efforts to ensure the questionnaire was appropriate for the public
sector.
There are several implications of the study for policymakers
and public procurement practitioners, and for future research.
Policymakers may need to consider how e-procurement and
sustainable procurement policy objectives can be better aligned.
There needs to be awareness that one policy might be pursued at
the sacrifice of the other, particularly as e-procurement seems to
hinder buying from SMEs. It may be appropriate for senior
policymakers to provide guidance as to which policy should be
prioritised. Practitioners may benefit from ensuring they have a
range of purchasing practices in place that do not exclude SMEs,
including more traditional approaches in parallel with e-procure-
ment. Future research could investigate how these policy objec-
tives might be better aligned, and how e-procurement tools and
other forms of e-business might be developed to support different
types of sustainable procurement, and how the trade-offs
between them might be reconciled.
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