The Environment Agency has gone out to tender with a contract to analyse and quantify the upstream supply chain sustainability impacts of the goods and services it procures.

The Agency is looking to express the impacts in both physical and financial terms which it says will enable it to identify where its biggest environmental and social risks are in its supply chain.

According the Agency, the analysis will provide environmental, reputational and financial benefits to both the Environment Agency and its suppliers. It will also be used to inform supplier engagement, support the Agency in establishing targets and reduce its environmental impacts, and provide a key data set for reporting sustainability performance to stakeholders in the Environment Agency’s annual report and accounts.

The majority of the Environment Agency benefits will be delivered by its flood and coastal erosion risk management and regulatory work. As has been previously identified, 70% of its negative environmental impacts are created by the supply chain which includes the work they undertake on the Agency’s behalf and the resources they consume.

The Environment Agency spends approximately £620 million annually with its 28,000 suppliers - the contract will cover just under 10,000 suppliers. 

The Environment Agency intends to award a contract to one supplier, with a possible future requirement to repeat the analysis and reporting exercise in approximately three years time, Deadline for tender submissions is 17th September 2014 and  the Agency is looking to have the contract in place by the end of September.

Critera for the research includes:

• Analysis work should identify high risk areas in the Agency’s supply chain.
• Cover the top 10,000 of suppliers down to a minimum of 3rd tier
• Quantify and cost both environmental and social impacts.
• The environmental impacts must include but should not be limited to the greenhouse gas (in metric tonnes of CO2e), waste (in metric tonnes) and water (in m3) impacts.
• Benchmark suppliers against industry / sector averages.
• Benchmark the Environment Agency against peer organisations where possible.
• Provide recommendations on how to reduce the most significant supply chain impacts.
• Help suppliers provide the data where possible.

The project will also include a cradle to grave (raw materials through to end of life) analysis is to be carried on three ‘hot-spot’ areas within the supply chain - to be identified and agreed with the Environment Agency once the full supply chain analysis has been carried out.  The analysis will also need to include a supply chain map and a climate change scenario analysis.

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