Govt to soon bring transparency in green public procurement

Aiming to provide next level of ease of doing business in India, the government today said it will soon put in place transparency in public procurement of green products.
Currently, environmental and green procurement laws in the country are under the purview of several ministries and other government bodies, often with significant overlap in responsibility and oversight.
"As far as tendering is concerned, many alternative proposals are being considered so as to bring transparency. ...The methods, procedure and criteria (for procurement) has to be same. That's a long pending issue and the government is seriously addressing those issues," Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar said on the sidelines of second Indo-German Environment forum event here.

The government will provide "next level of ease of doing business with predictable processes and mechanism in place in shorter time" with regard to public procurement of green products, he added.
The Minister was replying to a query on whether the government is addressing the concerns of developed nations with regard to India's public procurement policy.
Stating that India is taking measures to address concerns of developed nations, Javadekar said, "I think Germany and other developed countries were facing many roadblocks earlier. But one by one, the Environment Ministry has provided an ease of doing business so far as permissions are concerned.

"We are moving towards one window shop where they will get clearance at one window. All ministries and authorities will be tied together. This is the beginning," he said.
According to experts, India's public procurement of green products and technologies has been on an ad-hoc basis. For instance, Indian Railways has taken measures to improve energy efficiency and installed green toilets on its coaches.