Finland

1. Policy

The Finnish Act on Public Procurement and Concession Contracts № 1397/2016 includes the following RBC objectives – additional frameworks apply, depending on the RBC objective:

Environment

This aspect is also included in the Climate Change Act, № 609/2015, the Government Programme 2019; and Act №1509/2011, which defines aspects related to energy and the environment to be taken into account when procuring motor vehicles.

Human rights

The Government Programme 2019 promotes this objective.

Labour rights

The Government Programme 2019 promotes this objective.

People with disabilities

The Act on Providing Digital Services № 306/2019 refers to the principles and technologies that must be followed in the design, development, maintenance and updating of digital services in order to make them more accessible to people with disabilities.

Long-term unemployed people

Other policy frameworks

• Gender

The Act on Equality between Women and Men, № 609/1986.

• Integrity

The Finnish Act on Contractor's obligations and liability and the Government Programme 2019.

Strategic frameworks

• The National Public Procurement Strategy (2020) intends to increase the level of ecological, social and economic responsibility in public procurement.

• Hansel Ltd. is a non-profit limited company that acts as a CPB for central and local governments in Finland. They have a specific policy, described in their Corporate Responsibility Report (2017). The policy includes environmental and social considerations in the CPB’s work. The most recent Hansel Compliance programme was accepted in November 2019.

2. Implementation

Hansel Ltd. aims at including environmental policy objectives during each phase of the procurement cycle.

Pre-tender phase

• During this phase of the procurement procedure, Hansel Ltd. conducts a risk analysis on social issues. Depending on the risk analysis’ outcomes, a specific requirement on human rights are included as a general contract performance clause.

Tender phase

• Regarding the respect of environmental considerations, Hansel Ltd. uses the Green Public Procurement toolkit of the European Commission to learn best practices and include them in procurement procedure. They also use the Nordic Swan Ecolabel and EU-Ecolabel criteria as basis for their procurement requirements.

• Hansel Ltd. requires suppliers to present a report on tax payments, pension insurance payments and requirement for reporting credit information. To improve reporting and ease the procedure, a digitalised service is used to check this information during the contract phase.

• When procuring computers through its framework agreement, Hansel Ltd. gives extra awarding points in the following cases:

  • If the supplier submits a list on final assembly locations of the computers and component supplier of the computers;

  • If the supplier submits a list and means of proof that the trademark owner had openly published a list of final assembly locations of the computers;

  • If the supplier had attached lists a) and b), and provided proof that the trademark owner had openly published a list of final assembly locations and of component suppliers of the computers.

  • If the supplier can proof that:

    • living wage was paid at the final assembly factories of the computers.

    • if the actual total working hours (including overtime) were at the most 48 hours per week on average.

3. Good Practices

• Hansel Ltd. has a dedicated support team on sustainability issues, helping Hansel's own purchasing experts and lawyers on including sustainability consideration in their framework agreements and dynamic purchasing systems. A customer support team is available to provide occasional support on sustainability issues.

• Hansel Ltd. has developed some ecolabels, such as the Green Label (2011). This label signals that environmental considerations have been taken into account in a framework agreement. Other social and economic labels were established in late 2019.