BASTA in procurement
Set requirements for products
When procuring a building or civil engineering contract, it is important that requirements are set for which products are to be used in the project. This is to ensure that the contractor primarily uses products that are controlled for the content of particularly dangerous substances. An example of a claim:
- Built-in products must pass grade BASTA (alternatively BASTA or BETA)
- This can be proven by the products being registered with the grade BASTA (alternatively BASTA or BETA) or documented in another reliable way
- Deviations from these requirements must be reported as deviations
- Requirements can also be made that products must be registered with the grade DECLARED if they do not pass BASTA or BETA, to facilitate work with deviations
Public procurement
Public purchasers are increasingly beginning to refer to criteria for environmental assessment in procurement. According to the EU's procurement directive, a technical specification may make a reference to specific criteria, but it may not demand that a specific environmental assessment system be used to demonstrate that the criteria are met.
It is important to bear in mind that with few exceptions, the grade BASTA is approved as verification even when requirements are made with reference to the criteria of competing environmental assessment systems. As a contractor, you can therefore use grade BASTA to verify safe product choices, with regard to hazardous substances, in public procurement of construction contracts.
The procurement authority helps public actors set environmental and social requirements in procurement. Among other things, they provide procurement criteria that give advice on requirements when procuring goods and services. In the procurement criteria for construction contracts, reference is made to BASTA's criteria regarding product selection.