Earlier today, the government unveiled a new green strategy aiming to make procurements made by the public sector more sustainable.
Among the initiatives are the use of greener vehicles by the public sector, a 60 percent organic food minimum, and two meatless days a week in public canteens.
“For the first time in history, the government has launched a collected strategy for green public procurements,” said the finance minister, Nicolai Wammen.
“We do it because we want to become better at considering the climate, environment and sustainability when purchasing in the future. As one of the first countries in the world, we set a figure to how much the green procurements will help reduce Denmark’s overall emissions.”
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Greener cars, bulbs and cleaning products
Aside from the aforementioned elements of the strategy, the government also wants to make it mandatory for state canteenes to use products that live up to environmental demands.
The new demands will only encompass state employee canteens for now – so not those run by municipalities or the regional authorities.
Other initiatives of the strategy include more electric cars used by the state, greener cleaning products and all light bulbs in state institutions being switched to more climate-friendly LED bulbs.
According to the government, the state uses 380 billion kroner annually on its consumption – contributing 12 million tonnes of CO2 emissions.
