Düsseldorf's city administration consumes about 40 million sheets of office paper annually. On the other hand, the city collects about 36,000 tonnes of used paper and cardboard per year, which is then sold off to recycling companies.

With the primary aim of stimulating demand and ensuring a price reduction for recycled paper, Dusseldorf developed an internal regulation for sustainable procurement, which led to an increase of the use of recycled office paper accounting for 85% of all the city’s paper use in 2016.

The city found a solution thanks to a German factory that develops recycled office papers with a guaranteed high technical quality and a good brightness. Their paper is very similar to ‘fresh fibre’ paper, allowing the city to roll out only recycled paper in its offices. The solution is certified by the standards defined by the independent ‘RAL Deutsches Institut für Gütesicherung und Kennzeichnung e.V.’ (German Institute for Quality Assurance and Labeling) and its German ‘blue environmental angel’ label.

Another challenge the city encountered was making sustainable, or circular, procurement manageable in the complicated procedures of public procurement.