Ciarán Ahern (Dublin South West, Labour)
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225. To ask the Minister for Environment, Community and Local Government for a progress report on the implementation of Buying Greener: Green Public Procurement Strategy and Action Plan 2024-2027; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [39457/25]

Alan Dillon (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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In April 2024, the Department published Buying Greener: Green Public Procurement Strategy and Action Plan 2024-2027 to drive the implementation of green and circular procurement practices across the public sector.

The Department is leading on the coordination and review of the Green Public Procurement Strategy and Action Plan implementation. The Office of Government Procurement (OGP), which has responsibility for procurement policy and procedures for the public sector, has an important role in delivering a number of key actions included in the Green Public Procurement Strategy and Action Plan. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has a key operational role in implementing a number of key actions, particularly in the context of their responsibility for developing National Green Public Procurement guidance and criteria.

Key actions since the publication of the Buying Greener: Green Public Procurement Strategy and Action Plan 2024-2027 include, for example:

• The EPA has published updated Green Public Procurement Guidance and Criteria sets, including a new Green Public Procurement criteria set for furniture.
• The Green Public Procurement Criteria Search tool, launched in 2022, facilitates ease of use of the updated national criteria published by the EPA.
• The updated Public Sector Climate Action Mandate, as published in the Climate Action Plan 2025, includes strengthened Green Public Procurement obligations for public sector bodies that are subject to the mandate that reflects the new Buying Greener: Green Public Procurement Strategy and Action Plan 2024-2027.
• The OGP established a new framework that allows public bodies to purchase remanufactured laptops. The OGP also launched a new framework arrangement for recycled office paper.
• Ireland has entered into a voluntary agreement to co-operate with other bodies, internationally, to improve the sustainability of ICT procurement. Known as the Circular and Fair ICT Pact (CFIT), this voluntary initiative is an international procurement-led partnership with a remit to accelerate circularity, fairness, and sustainability in the ICT sector.
• The Government approved new public procurement guidance to promote the reduction of embodied carbon in construction.