Building a sustainable supply chain

NHS Digital’s Commercial team has responded positively and proactively to the increasingly important challenge of improving sustainability impacts and awareness across the supply chain. 

Going beyond simply ensuring NHS Digital procurements were compliant with the government’s Social Value Procurement Policy Note (PPN) 06/20 (effective 1 January 2021) and the Carbon Reduction Plan PPN 06/21 (effective 30 September 2021), the team established a clear approach to delivering positive sustainability change through their commercial remit.

A working group was established to create a plan and set objectives. They identified 4 areas of focus to meet their objectives:

• strategy, policy and governance
• training
• management information (MI)
• supplier engagement

Each area set out key activities and plans, giving the team clear and common goals to support and track progress against.

They reported successes and achievements in 2021-22 across each of the key focus areas:

In 2021-22, the Commercial team made significant progress against their plan. Building on their success, they have set further objectives to develop their sustainability agenda going forward:

• develop supplier exemplars and case studies
• work with commercial colleagues at NHS England to pilot and launch the Evergreen sustainable supplier assessment
• embed social value through the contract management processes and contract lifecycle
• further explore (Scope 3) carbon measurement tooling options
• build sustainability into wider profession training