Environmental procurement

We continue to work with our main suppliers (by value) to understand how they are managing their own environmental impacts in line with our environmental policies.

Our worldwide procurement, valued at around £2.2 billion a year, makes this an important part of O2's environmental commitment.

We publish our policies on our procurement website and aim to communicate the standards we expect of our suppliers when we draw up contracts. We encourage suppliers to spread best practices to the companies they buy from. In 2004/05 we issued self-assessment questionnaires to some 20 of our key suppliers to check their environmental management practices.

We will use the results of these assessments in working with those suppliers to help them overcome any environmental risks they may face. Our environmental procurement policy guided us in the negotiations for a printing management provider to ensure that all paper came from sustainable resources. For more details on this and our approach to labour standards in the supply chain, see our section on ethical procurement.