# Sustainable Public Procurement in Central European Countries. Can It Also Bring Savings?
## 2 Materials and Methods  
The current research examined contract award notices (CANs) published in the TED database in 2017-2018. The basis of the dataset consists of over 700,000 CANs, sent to TED by contract authorities in Slovakia, Poland, the Czech Republic, and Hungary. As a result of their transformation from forms sent electronically for publication by the contracting authorities, the available data represent the so-called flat data, so each notice applies to each individual contract awarded to an individual supplier [32] (p. 4). The data contained in the original dataset only included notices that resulted in a contract, not those later canceled. The study excluded data relating to contracts awarded based on the lowest price criterion and data on procurements outside the scope of EU public procurement directives. Finally, only data were included from contracts awarded after the end of the 24-month transposition period (18 April 2016) to harmonize Member States' legislation with the provisions of EU Public Procurement Directives adopted in 2014. For the needs of the current research, a dataset was obtained consisting of 112,272 CANs, for which MEAT was used to award the contract. However, CANs without data on the estimated contract price had to be excluded. This led to a serious reduction in the number of contracts examined and left a final total of 52,435 contracts. For the purpose of the research, only those CANs for which the percentage saving was calculated as the difference between the estimated price and the final price of the contract from the interval [\(-\)100, 75] were considered. This was done due to fact that values outside this interval could have been caused by wrong data insertion by clerks who are in charge of it and institution representatives. Following this, the MEAT criteria that included one or more aspects of SPP were identified. To this end, four categories of aspects were developed through which SPP policy is implemented. In these, individual MEATs based on keywords and their language mutations were included. The first category represents environmental aspects and is often referred to as Green Public Procurement (GPP). The EC defines GPP [33] (p. 4) as \"a process whereby public authorities seek to procure goods, services and works with a reduced environmental impact throughout their life-cycle when compared to goods, services and works with the same primary function that would otherwise be procured\". The GPP is thus a policy tool designed to increase environmental protection and develop more environmentally sustainable economies [17]. The basic concept of GPP is based on the introduction of common environmental standards for technical specifications, award criteria, as well as contract performance clauses. Consistent application of GPP can lead to mutually beneficial situations where the reduction of environmental burdens is associated with a reduction in the related costs [34]. In other words, reducing environmental burdens through the green criteria set out in procurement may be reflected in future reductions in government spending on health care or environmental remediation. This category therefore includes criteria for evaluating bids in the form of, e.g., emission and toxicity reduction, various environmental certificates, environmentally focused qualifications of workers, waste recovery, and efficient use of resources. The second category includes social aspects and is referred to as Socially Responsible Public Procurement (SRPP). This is defined by the EC as procurement processes that take one or more social considerations into account, such as decent work, job opportunities, compliance with social and working condition rights, social inclusion, and access for all [12] (p. 7). The main purpose of the SRPP is to achieve societal objectives, such as the promotion of employment and equal opportunities, and inclusion and accessibility [35], by setting common standards for products and services, award criteria, as well as contract performance clauses.