Cleaner and Responsible Consumption 3 (2021) 100035

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Cleaner and Responsible Consumption

journal homepage: www.journals.elsevier.com/cleaner-and-responsible-consumption

Green public procurement as a promoter for green consumption: From the

perspective of individual's knowledge
Qi Wang a, Shuyu Wang a, Min Zhang b, Zehui Bu c, Junqi Liu a, *
a
School of Economics and Management, Southwest Jiaotong University, Chengdu, Sichuan, 610031, PR China
b
School of Management, Xihua University, Chengdu, Sichuan, 610000, PR China
c
School of Management Engineering, Qingdao University of Technology, Qingdao, Shandong, 266520, PR China

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Green public procurement is considered an environmental policy tool with great potential. Having been charged
Green public procurement with the responsibility of transforming greenness into a shared social norm, Green public procurement has the
Individual consumer potential to play an exemplary and guiding role for the individual consumer. This study develops a theoretical
Knowledge
model and conducts an empirical analysis of data collected from 336 situational questionnaires. The results
Green consumption
Sustainable development
indicate that consumer's knowledge of Green public procurement does not directly influence their green con-
sumption attitudes, and the moderation role of collectivism does not significant. However, consumer's knowledge
of Green public procurement has an indirect positive effect on their green consumption attitudes through two
mediators: (i). perceived value and (ii). perceived consumer effectiveness. This study has extended the research on
the effectiveness of Green public procurement to the field of individual green consumption, and the value of the
study is to provide new evidence for Green public procurement in promoting social sustainable development and
green production of enterprises from the perspective of knowledge transmission. Thus, we believe that it is
necessary to disseminate knowledge on Green public procurement to the public. However, presently China has too
few Green public procurement information disclosure channels to be known by the public. We suggest that public
authorities transmit relevant knowledge to the public through various media. Meanwhile, enterprises should
publicize the products on the Green public procurement list.

1. Introduction public procurement (GPP) an important policy tool in the struggle to

achieve sustainable development (Walker and Brammer, 2009). In many
Improving the environmental performance of a product's life cycle, countries, GPP is regarded as one of the most important drivers of and
expanding the demand for better products and improved production contributors to green consumption (Ho et al., 2010), and the effective-
techniques, and guiding consumers to make informed choices regarding ness of GPP is considered to have significant potential (Bratt et al., 2013).
consumption are all indispensable endeavours of a green economy (Eu- Directly, GPP can reduce the energy expenditures of the public authority,
ropean EC European Commission, 2013). However, the initiative of the reduce environmental pollution and contribute to creating an
public authority is vital in the commencing and continuance of the eco-friendly image of the government (Liu et al., 2019a). Indirectly, GPP
virtuous circle of a green economy (Testa et al., 2016). Initially, the is conducive to companies' innovations in technology and to markets'
public authority solved environmental problems based solely on com- expansion of green products (Saastamoinen et al., 2018; Michelsen and
mand and control. However, as more sophisticated interventions have Boer, 2009). Some studies also discuss the impact of GPP on thriving
emerged, the public authority itself has now entered the market as a sustainable development from the perspective of knowledge, but their
consumer (Testa et al., 2012). objects focus on only some specific stakeholders, such as public univer-
Consumers have long been regarded as the main force behind a sities (Pacheco-Blanco and Bastante-Ceca, 2016) or private sectors (Ho
country's green revolution (Chan, 2001). Accordingly, the considerable et al., 2010).
purchasing power of the public authority (Liu et al., 2021a) makes green Moreover, GPP is a government-oriented behaviour that incorporates

* Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: [email protected] (Q. Wang), [email protected] (S. Wang), [email protected] (M. Zhang), [email protected] (Z. Bu), jqliu@my.
swjtu.edu.cn (J. Liu).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.clrc.2021.100035
Received 26 March 2021; Received in revised form 19 July 2021; Accepted 25 August 2021
2666-7843/© 2021 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-
nc-nd/4.0/).
Q. Wang et al. Cleaner and Responsible Consumption 3 (2021) 100035

social responsibility (Uttam and Roos, 2015) and it is the public plays a great policy-oriented role in green production and consumption
authority's obligation to transform greenness into a shared social norm (Nissinen et al., 2009; Zhu et al., 2013). As early as 2004, the Chinese
(Welsch and Jan 2018). In other words, the public authority plays a government specified in related policies that GPP should be conductive to
leading role in the transition from traditional consumption to green saving energy, protecting the environment, and raising awareness of the
consumption (Bala et al., 2008). Fostering green consumption awareness resource crisis in the whole of society (Implementation Guidelines for
requires policy makers to develop interventions, with an emphasis on Government Procurement of Energy-saving Products, 2004). In recent
what consumers should and should not do (Paul et al., 2016). As the most years, the effectiveness of GPP has gradually become a research focus.
authoritative consumer in a country, the public authority can effectively On the one hand, the public authorities are consumers with great
be an example and a guide for its followers—the individual consumers purchasing power, and they consume a significant portion of Gross Do-
(Liu et al., 2019a). However, the potential role of GPP for the public or mestic Product (Liu et al., 2019a). The huge consumption quantities of
future consumers is unclear (Pacheco-Blanco and Bastante-Ceca, 2016). the governments have a direct impact on environmental performance,
The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development including the reduction of environmental pollution and energy con-
thinks education is one of the most important approaches to attract sumption during production, transportation, use and recycling processes
sustainable consumers by providing suitable skills and abilities (OECD (Cerutti et al., 2016; Neto and Caldas, 2018). More than 90% of products
Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development, 2008). This of public procurement designated projects in Taiwan, China, were
fully expresses that knowledge is of great importance for green con- green-mark products, which made positive progress in environmental
sumption. However, knowledge not only comes from education but also sustainability (Tsai, 2017). Cerutti et al. (2016) studied the different
sometimes comes from social learning. Social learning is mainly achieved effects of GPP policies on the carbon emissions at three phases in the
through mutual action within a social group or between social groups, supply chain of school catering services in Italy, and they found that the
which produces new shared knowledge (Pacheco-Blanco and production phase had the largest carbon emission reduction.
Bastante-Ceca, 2016). Scholars have repeatedly mentioned the potential GPP is usually carried out in the form of specific types of functional
of GPP to guide green consumption throughout society (Ho et al., 2010; criteria, environmental requirements, environmental criteria or envi-
Liu et al., 2019b), but no specific discussion has been conducted. Indi- ronmental incentives (Igarashi et al., 2015; Vidal and S
anchez-Pantoja,
vidual consumers are the main force of green consumption, nonetheless, 2019). Suppliers are motivated to improve their environmental perfor-
it is still unknown whether individual consumers can reach a consensus mance to be more competitive in the face of “green purchasers” (Murray,
on values and collective action regarding environmental protection and 2000). As a GPP scheme in the Netherlands, the CO2 Performance Ladder
green consumption with public institutions after understanding GPP could significantly reduce the greenhouse gas emissions of participating
knowledge, which is a research gap in the field of GPP effectiveness. enterprises (Rietbergen and Blok, 2013). The functional criteria in GPP
The above show that GPP has both the obligation and the potential public tenders could stimulate product/process innovations (Rizzi et al.,
ability to influence individual consumers, and the influence may be 2014). For example, GPP for wood in Europe stimulated consumption
realized by spreading knowledge. According to the knowledge-attitude- and production of certified wood (Brusselaers et al., 2017). Furthermore,
practice (KAP) theory, new knowledge can first affect an individual's environmental criteria and requirements could also promote circular
attitude towards something (Kabinda et al., 2014), and attitude is the economies and related business models (Alhola et al., 2018).
most important determinant of green behaviour (Paul et al., 2016; Taylor In general, in industries where public procurement has a large market
and Todd, 1995; Leonidou et al., 2010). Therefore, the research questions share, such as construction, medical services or transportation, GPP is the
guiding this study are as follows: Can GPP knowledge influence the green main source of innovation by creating green products and services
consumption attitudes of individual consumers? How is this impact (Lundberg et al., 2015). Nevertheless, these influences are not always
achieved? significant. In fact, the ambitious goals of greenhouse gas reduction that
A conceptual model is developed to explore the relationship between were set by enterprises might not be achieved in the CO2 Performance
consumers' GPP knowledge and their green consumption attitudes. The Ladder (Rietbergen et al., 2015). Lundberg et al. (2015) argued that GPP
empirical results from 336 questionnaires indicate that there exists an was considered an environmental policy tool, which had finite or even
indirect relationship between the two. That is, consumers' GPP knowl- counterproductive impact on polluting enterprises' choice to adopt the
edge has a positive effect on their green consumption attitudes by environmental requirements of the public authority and invest green
increasing their perceived value and perceived consumer effectiveness technologies. Nikolaou and Loizou (2015) also believed that there was
with respect to green consumption. The most important theoretical little impact of GPP on enterprises’ decisions about environmental issues.
contribution in this study is to explore the potential impact of GPP on On the other hand, public authorities can become effective informa-
individual consumers and to clarify the influencing mechanism between tion communicators. GPP has an impact on sustainable development
the two, which provides new evidence for contributions of GPP to sus- through the dissemination of green consumption knowledge/ideas to the
tainable development of the whole society. Second, the impact of GPP on outside world. The public authorities of Belfast invited potential sup-
the demand side of green products, namely, consumers, is confirmed in pliers to fill out questionnaires about environmental management, and
the paper, which provide new incentives to encourage green production the purpose was not only to review the quality of suppliers but also to
of enterprises. Finally, this study confirms that the government's inter- raise awareness of them about the environmental management system, to
vention on environmental issues need not be restricted to simply exerting educate and make sustainable promises to them (Murray, 2000). The
pressure (Grandia et al., 2015), but rather, the government can also solve majority of GPP staff in Spanish public universities agreed that GPP was
problems by facilitating the transmitting of GPP knowledge. effective in spreading environmental knowledge and raising relevant
The remainder of this study is organized as follows. Section 2 pro- consciousness (Pacheco-Blanco and Bastante-Ceca, 2016). The govern-
vides a literature review, while Section 3 presents the development of the ment of Hong Kong in China further popularized and promoted green
hypotheses and the conceptual model. Section 4 introduces the meth- procurement by disseminating GPP knowledge (Hong Kong Green Pur-
odology. Section 5 presents results. Section 6 presents academic and chasing Charter, 2010) to the private sector (Ho et al., 2010). In addition,
practical contributions. The last section is limitations and future research. Simcoe and Toffel (2014) found that even if the municipal green building
procurement policy did not provide clear rules or incentives to encourage
2. Literature review private adoption of this policy, private real estate developers would still
be affected by spillover effects. This was because the public procurement
2.1. Effectiveness of GPP of green buildings could stimulate local demand of green construction by
raising people's awareness of the influence of buildings on the environ-
GPP has been implemented worldwide for more than decade, and it ment and accelerating the spread of new environmental standards.

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Q. Wang et al. Cleaner and Responsible Consumption 3 (2021) 100035

In summary, GPP truly has the potential to guide the green con- satisfaction with the government. The more the consumers know about
sumption of society as a whole (Ho et al., 2010; Liu et al., 2019b). GPP, the more they recognize the government's efforts and contributions
However, the current research only focuses on stakeholders such as to protect the environment. Therefore, these consumers are more satis-
public authorities and the private sector and neglects another consumer fied with the government and more willing to respond to the govern-
group in society —individual consumers. Individual consumers are the ment's appeal for green consumption (Durant and Legge, 2005),
main force of green consumption, their demands are a huge driving force believing that green consumption is the informed choice.
behind the green production of enterprises (Nikolaou and Loizou, 2015), Accordingly, we propose the following hypothesis.
and they are also the biggest contributors to social sustainable develop-
H1. The consumers' knowledge of GPP exerts a positive, direct impact
ment (Chan, 2001). Therefore, it is worth studying whether individual
on their attitudes towards green consumption.
consumers will be affected by GPP knowledge.
Consumption is affected by the commonality of culture and the value
2.2. Individual green consumption it gives (Henry, 1976). However, interpretations of culture, individu-
alism and collectivism regarding consumption behaviours vary (Kim,
One's attitude towards green consumption largely depends on how 2011). More specifically, groups with a higher degree of individualism
much value (from the functional, social, and emotional viewpoints) one tend to act individually, while collectivists give priority to shared goals
thinks the matter has and on how much impact one's behaviour has on (Hofstede, 1980, 2011). Scholars from countries such as Vietnam, India,
the environment (Ha and Janda, 2012; Yu and Lee, 2019). From the Canada, the United States, and South Korea compared the differences
perspective of culture, scholars have also found that consumers with between collectivistic cultures and individualistic cultures and concluded
higher collectivism had more positive attitudes towards green con- that the collectivistic culture had a more positive impact on promoting
sumption because they regarded environmental protection and green green attitudes among consumers (Nguyen et al., 2017; Sreen et al.,
consumption as the collective goals of the whole society (Nguyen et al., 2018; Sarig€ ollü, 2009; Kim et al., 2012).
2017; Sreen et al., 2018). Similarly, Chinese consumers who value collectivism are more likely
Social learning is one of the important factors inspiring green con- to purchase green products (Lao and Wang, 2015; Chan and Lau, 2002).
sumption, and imitating or learning from others is one of the most Chinese traditional cultures are characterized by collectivist principles,
important means by which humans finesse the bounds of rationality the most representative of which is the Confucian culture, which appeals
(Buenstorf and Cordes, 2008). The information that individuals are to individuals to sacrifice their personal interests to achieve collective
exposed to determines their acquisition of consumption knowledge, and goals. In this study, consumers with GPP knowledge are more aware that
most of the information related to consumption is provided by the social green consumption is not only the government's goal but also the col-
environment. The dissemination information through social groups and lective goal of the whole society. Therefore, the more collectivistic an
mass media has a substantial impact on the acquisition of consumption individual is, the more willing the individual is to improve his/her green
knowledge. Setting a role model is a powerful way for social groups and consumption attitude to achieve the collective goal.
mass media to influence consumers’ green consumption behaviour. Accordingly, we propose the following hypothesis.
People tend to imitate successful or reputable people, observe role
H2. Higher degrees of collectivism among consumers strengthen the
models and adopt their successful behaviours (Bandura, 1986).
relationship between their GPP knowledge and their green consumption
As the public authority is the most prestigious green consumer in the
attitudes.
whole of society, whether individual consumers will be affected by public
authorities through social learning remains to be studied. If consumers acquire knowledge about GPP, their perceived value of
green products can be promoted. The premise behind attitude-based
3. Hypotheses development inference is that consumers generally make judgments regarding their
conducts based on limited information (Kardes et al., 2004). Accordingly,
The learning strategies are divided into two types, namely, inten- when consumers have increased knowledge about something, such as
tional learning and incidental learning (Newton et al., 2015). In this GPP, they make a corresponding judgment regarding green products and
study, consumers obtain GPP knowledge from questionnaires, i.e., green consumption behaviours (Newton et al., 2015). In 2018, the Chi-
through intentional learning. The GPP knowledge addressed on the nese government purchased energy-saving and water-saving products at
questionnaire includes GPP concepts, the scale and situation of GPP in a cost of approximately 165.38 billion yuan (approximately 23.47 billion
various countries, contributions of GPP to sustainable development, and dollars) and environment-friendly products at a cost of 164.74 billion
primary goods involved in GPP (Liu et al., 2019a; Zhu et al., 2013). yuan (approximately 23.38 billion dollars). The public authorities' huge
Consumers will show a more positive attitude towards green con- demand for green products improves consumers’ confidence in the
sumption when they have an understanding of GPP, which comes first quality of green products and enhances their perceptions of functional
from their affective commitment towards green consumption. GPP is value (Woo and Kim, 2019). In addition, because of the authority of the
regarded as the government's commitment to sustainable development government, consumers are more convinced that green consumption
(Murray, 2000), and procurement officials who possess greater GPP preserves the environment, and thus, the purchasing of green goods has a
knowledge are more motivated to voluntarily enforce stricter green positive effect on their degree of happiness (Yu and Lee, 2019). Com-
standards due to their affective commitment and to induce others to do bined, these factors increase their perceived emotional value of green
the same (Grandia, 2016). This theory is predicted to the same conclu- consumption. As public authorities are covered in everywhere in the
sion when it is extended to the consumer field. world, those with an understanding of GPP realize that purchasing green
Second, a positive attitude towards green consumption is a response products is not only a personal need but also a social need, and such
to environmental policies. Nikolaou and Loizou (2015) found that realization strengthens their perceived social value (Sweeney and Soutar,
managers who understood GPP-related policies (such as the National 2001; Orset et al., 2017).
Plan of GPP and European GPP Toolkit) were more inclined to incorpo- High perceived value at both affective and societal levels, including
rate more environmental standards into public contracts. Similarly, the perception of product quality, improves the green consumption at-
consumers understand the GPP policy, which will make it easier for them titudes of consumers (Kunzlik, 2003; Shen et al., 2017). Consumers who
to consider using environmental standards in their consumption. highly value the environment were disposed to consider green products
Moreover, consumers' support for environmental policies is also when purchasing electronic products (Chen and Chang, 2012). This view
related to their satisfaction with the government (Park et al., 2015). was also confirmed in research regarding the purchasing of a green en-
Public authority's environmental behaviours can improve public ergy motorcycle (Wu et al., 2015). Hence, we believe that GPP

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Q. Wang et al. Cleaner and Responsible Consumption 3 (2021) 100035

knowledge increases the perceived value of consumers and strengthens discussion on its influence mechanism. The conceptual model established
their green consumption attitudes. in this paper is a mediation model with moderating effect, which at-
Accordingly, we propose the following hypothesis. tempts to explore the influence mechanism between consumers' GPP
knowledge and their green consumption attitude. H1 represents the
H3. Perceived value mediates consumers' GPP knowledge and their
direct positive correlation between the two, and H2 represents the pos-
green consumption attitudes.
itive moderating effect of collectivism in the above relationship. H3 and
Having a greater understanding of GPP means that consumers are H4 indicate that consumers’ GPP knowledge enhances their green con-
more aware of the practical effect of consumption behaviour on envi- sumption attitude by improving their perceived value and perceived
ronmental protection. Except in special and extreme cases, most consumer effectiveness.
environment-related features (such as climate warming and poor air
quality) are difficult for consumers to sense, so the environmental impact 4. Methodology
of consumer behaviours may be too vague or too indirect to be noticed
(Buenstorf and Cordes, 2008). However, GPP can effectively alleviate 4.1. Questionnaire design
environmental problems, which has been verified by scholars and sup-
ported by sufficient data (Sӧnnichsen and Clement, 2020). When this In order to test the hypotheses H1-H4, this study use a questionnaire
objective reality is presented to consumers as GPP-related knowledge, survey to collect data. The main reason for using the questionnaire survey
they will truly understand the consequential role of consumption in is to refer to the existing relevant research (Liu et al., 2019a, 2020, 2020).
environmental protection, green production and sustainable develop- The design of questionnaire have two steps, the first steps is to select
ment. This understanding encourages consumers to reflect on the impact suitable items for research variables. The items are obtained from pre-
of consumption on the environment, which results in improving their vious studies. Specifically, GPP knowledge (GPPK) is measured using
perceived consumer effectiveness (Newton et al., 2015). three items (Wang et al., 2017), green consumption attitude (ATT) is
When consumers perceive that their personal efforts can greatly assessed using four items (Matthes et al., 2014; Paul et al., 2016),
contribute to solving environmental problems, they tend to value green perceived value of green products (PV) is based on three items (Yu and
consumption (Berger and Corbin, 1992; Ellen et al., 1991). In the past, Lee, 2019), perceived consumer effectiveness (PCE) is determined by
scholars have studied the impact of perceived consumer effectiveness on four items (Zhao et al., 2018), and collectivistic culture (COL) is
green consumption based on the domestic conditions of the consumer. measured using three items (Leonidou et al., 2010). The second step is to
The results indicated that Korean consumers who believed their con- exam the face validity. We invite 3 master student and 2 Ph.D. candidates
sumer behaviours improved the environment expressed a more positive to exam the face validity and has been approved.
attitude towards green products (Park and Sohn, 2018). Studies in the The study collects data via an online questionnaire to test the four
US, Canada, China, and India have reached similar conclusions (Choi and hypotheses. The questionnaire is comprised of three sections (see Ap-
Johnson, 2019; Kang et al., 2013; Zhao et al., 2018; Sharma and Dayal, pendix A). The first section gathers the respondents’ demographic data,
2016; Jaiswal and Kant, 2018). Therefore, we reasonably deduce that such as gender, age, income, education, and employment. This is fol-
GPP knowledge contributes to perceived consumer effectiveness and thus lowed by some knowledge of GPP. Finally, data needed for the model are
strengthens the green consumption attitudes of consumers. collected. A 5-point Likert scale is used to assess the five variables using
Accordingly, we propose the following hypothesis. 17 questions. The scale ranges from 1 (completely disagree) to 5
(completely agree).
H4. Perceived consumer effectiveness mediates consumers' GPP
knowledge and their green consumption attitudes.
4.2. Sample and data collection
Based on these four hypotheses, the conceptual model is developed.
Fig. 1 provides a display of the model. After administering a pilot test to minimize respondent bias, certain
As shown in Fig. 1, this model is similar to the conceptual model words in the survey were revised to improve comprehension and accu-
established by He and Zhang (2021), both of which explore the impact of racy. Referring to survey methods (Xue et al., 2017), the paper entrusted
environmental policies on micro-economies. However, He and Zhang the data collection company, Shanghai Loop Information Technology Co.
(2021) only explored the direct correlation between environmental Ltd., to invite interviewees to participate in the online survey. According
policy and residents' willingness to pay for green products, ignoring the to the survey company's ability to search survey candidate, we select
survey candidates' job mainly including student, staff, junior manager,
mid manager, senior/top manager.
To reduce common method variance (CMV) issues and ensure ob-
jectivity, the questionnaires were anonymous. Meanwhile, each section
of the questionnaire had an established minimum reading time to fully
understand the content and respond to the items.
The participants of this study, which was conducted in September
2019, were Chinese residents. The questionnaire distribution process was
conducted by the aforementioned survey company, a total of 400 ques-
tionnaires were returned. After eliminating obvious irregularities and
inconsistencies (Yin and Shi, 2019), the number of valid questionnaires
was 336. The sample details are presented in Table 1.

4.3. Measures

SPSS 24 and AMOS 23 are used to examine the hypotheses, and a

confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) is conducted to verify the reliability
and validity of the questionnaire (Anderson and Gerbing, 1988). Cron-
bach's α coefficient is used to evaluate the reliability of the model, and as
the coefficients of all variables exceed 0.74, which is higher than the
Fig. 1. Conceptual model. accepted 0.7 (Nunnally, 1978; Hair et al., 2015), the model is deemed

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Q. Wang et al. Cleaner and Responsible Consumption 3 (2021) 100035

Table 1 Table 3
Demographic profile of respondents (N ¼ 336). Correlation analysis.
N Percentage N Percentage ATT GPPK PV PCE COL

Gender Job ATT (0.6996)

Male 178 52.98% Student 102 30.36% GPPK 0.164** (0.801)
Female 158 47.02% Staff 124 36.90% PV 0.633** 0.248** (0.7824)
Age Junior manager 37 11.01% PCE 0.552** 0.308** 0.702** (0.6957)
Under 20 28 8.33% Mid manager 65 19.35% COL 0.456** 0.175** 0.505** 0.621** (0.7065)
20-30 210 62.50% Senior/Top manager 8 2.38%
30-40 77 22.92% Monthly disposable Note: Diagonal values show square root of AVE for each construct, ** Significant
Income (Units: Yuan) at the 0.05 level.
40-50 15 4.46% Less than 1500 76 22.62%
Over 50 6 1.79% 1500–3000 44 13.10%
examined, and the findings reveal that the path coefficient of GPP to PV is
Education 3000–4500 48 14.29%
High school 17 5.06% 4500–6000 58 17.26%
0.2451 (R2 ¼ 0.2481, Adj-R2 ¼ 0.0616, F ¼ 21.9086), while the coeffi-
and below cient of PV to ATT is 0.4282. Given that both are significant and positive,
Junior college 47 13.96% More than 6000 110 32.74% H3 is supported. In the same way, the coefficient of GPPK to PCE is 0.277
Bachelor 204 60.71% (R2 ¼ 0.3083, Adj-R2 ¼ 0.0951, F ¼ 35.0853), and the coefficient of PCE
Master 64 19.05%
to ATT is 0.1503. As both are significant and positive, H4 is supported.
Ph.D 4 1.19%
Accordingly, it can be concluded from these results that GPPK positively
affects ATT through PV and PCE.
reliable. The results of the CFA, which are presented in Table 2, are as Additionally, we use the bootstrap method to validate the experi-
follows: Chi square (χ2)/df ¼ 2.132, GFI ¼ 0.922, IFI ¼ 0.951, mental model. The number of repeated samples is set at 5000, with a
NFI ¼ 0.911, TLI ¼ 0.938, CFI ¼ 0.950, RMSEA ¼ 0.058. Since the confidence interval (CI) of 95%. The bias-corrected percentile method is
standardized factor loadings of all items are greater than 0.6, which ex- applied to the sampling. If the upper and lower limits of the CI do not
ceeds the threshold of 0.5, and the composite reliability (CR) ranges include 0, the test results are considered valid. Table 6 presents a specific
between 0.7484 and 0.8426, which exceeds the minimum standard of analysis wherein the upper and lower CI limits of the relationships be-
0.7, it is determined that the questionnaire exhibits good convergent tween GPPK to ATT are all greater than 0. In other words, the relationship
validity (Testa et al., 2019; Chin et al., 1997; Bagozzi and Yi, 1988). between GPPK and ATT is subject to the positive mediating effect of PV.
Moreover, all variables are significantly correlated, as presented in Similarly, PCE mediates the relationship between GPPK and ATT,
Table 3. Finally, a comparison of the square root of the AVE of each although the direct effect of GPPK towards ATT is not significant because
variable with the correlation coefficient indicates that the former is it contains 0. Hence, PV and PCE play a full mediating role for GPPK and
higher than the correlation coefficient of the variables. Thus, discrimi- ATT (Grandia and Voncken, 2019), and H3 and H4 are supported.
nant validity is within expectations. Finally, the results of the model are shown in Table 7.

5. Results 6. Conclusion

Tables 4 and 5 present the results of the path analysis. SPSS Process is This study discusses the relationship between consumers' GPP
used for model analysis, and according to the conceptual model of the knowledge and their green consumption attitudes. A conceptual model is
research, we select Model 1 to test the moderating effect and Model 5 to developed based on TPB, and 336 samples are collected for empirical
verify the mediating effect (Hayes, 2018). As indicated in Table 4, study through situational questionnaires. The results show that GPP
GPPK*COL has a negative, albeit insignificant, influence on ATT, COL knowledge positively affects consumers’ green consumption attitudes
fails to moderate the relationship between GPPK and ATT, and H2 is not indirectly through two mediating variables, namely, perceived value and
supported. perceived consumer effectiveness. The research questions are answered.
Table 5 indicates that the relationship between GPPK and ATT is not The results of the empirical study are discussed below, and some practical
significant, thus suggesting that GPPK cannot directly affect ATT, and implications are given.
thus, H1 is not supported. The mediating effect of the model is also
7. Discussion

Table 2 The empirical results show that GPP knowledge can't directly improve
Standardized factor loadings, composite reliability, and Cronbach's-α. consumers' green consumption attitudes, and even a strong sense of
Items SFL a
Cronbach's-ɑ Composite Reliability collectivism cannot enhance the connection between the two. The result
can be explained by institutional theory, that is, consumers are not direct
ATT1 0.750 0.794 0.7924
ATT2 0.739 stakeholders of GPP like suppliers and procurement staff (Murray, 2000;
ATT3 0.651 Grandia, 2016), and they are not concerned about potential pressure or
ATT4 0.652 punishment because of non-green consumption (Grandia et al., 2015);
PCE1 0.661 0.789 0.7893 thus, consumers are not directly constrained by this policy. The result
PCE2 0.728
PCE3 0.709
also affirms the view that emotional attachment is superior to the
PCE4 0.683 cognitive understanding in the course of affecting attitude changes
COL1 0.720 0.748 0.7484 (Chan, 2001), and there should be some emotion-related mediating
COL2 0.636 variables between cognition and attitude.
COL3 0.758
In addition, the cultural value of collectivism profoundly affects the
GPPK1 0.755 0.841 0.8426
GPPK2 0.863 beliefs and behaviours of the Chinese people (Chan, 2001), but for green
GPPK3 0.781 consumption, consumers are more willing to regard it as a personal
PV1 0.786 0.825 0.8255 choice. Therefore, it is more effective for public authorities to create a
PV2 0.749 shared sense of environmental responsibility (Paul et al., 2016), rather
PV3 0.811
than simply portraying green consumption as a collective goal to the
a
SFL refers to standard factor loading.

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Q. Wang et al. Cleaner and Responsible Consumption 3 (2021) 100035

Table 4
Moderating effect of COL on relationships between ATT and GPPK.
Variables ATT ATT
a
Estimate SE t Estimate SE t

Constant 0.0000 0.0424 0.0000 0.0012 0.0386 0.0305

GPPK 0.1477*** 0.0487 3.0313 0.0793* 0.045 1.7633
COL 0.4244*** 0.0477 8.8999
PCE
PV
GPPK*COL 0.0095 0.0483 0.1968

R2 0.0270 0.4640
Adj-R2 0.0240 0.2153
F 9.189*** 30.3707***
a
SE refers to standard error, ***, ** and * means significant at level of 1%, 5% and 10%, respectively.

Table 5
The results of mediating effect model test.
Variables PV PCE ATT

Estimate SEa t Estimate SE t Estimate SE t

Constant 0.0000 0.0455 0.0000 0.0000 0.0407 0.0000 0.0021 0.0329 0.0647
GPPK 0.2451*** 0.0524 4.6807 0.277*** 0.0468 5.9233 0.0216 0.0397 0.5434
COL 0.1265** 0.0513 2.4657
PCE 0.1503** 0.0660 2.2777
PV 0.4282*** 0.0535 7.9967
GPPK*COL 0.0172 0.0412 0.4171

R2 0.2481 0.3083 0.6596

Adj-R2 0.0616 0.0951 0.4350
F 21.9086*** 35.0853*** 50.8227***
a
SE refers to standard error, ***, ** and * means significant at level of 1%, 5% and 10%, respectively.

(Schwartz and Bilsky, 1990).

Table 6
In addition to perceived value, consumers’ GPP knowledge can also
Direct, indirect and total effects between latent variables.
improve their perceived consumer effectiveness and indirectly increase
Effect Boot SE Lower limits Upper limits their attitude towards green consumption. This confirms the opinion of
Direct 0.0216 0.0478 0.1136 0.0739 Buenstorf and Cordes (2008) that consumers can perceive the impact of
GPPK—>PV—>ATT 0.1049 0.0292 0.0519 0.1646 consumption on the environment because they have the ability to make
GPPK—>PCE—>ATT 0.0416 0.0217 0.0033 0.0881 social observations. In the minds of consumers, the public authority is
Total 0.1466 0.0384 0.0746 0.2238
unlikely to spend a lot of staff, material and financial resources on ini-
tiatives that are ineffective, so GPP can convey definite information to
consumers, that is, green consumption can make a substantial change to
Table 7 environmental pollution. This also supports the view of Paul et al.
Research results.
(2016), in which consumers comprehend the long-term impact of green
Path Hypotheses Supported consumption on the environment, which is the responsibility of not only
H1: GPPK —> ATT No green product marketers (Han et al., 2010) but also policy makers. In
H2: GPPK*COL —> ATT No summary, it is necessary and important for consumers to have full con-
H3: GPPK —> PV —> ATT Yes fidence in their ability to change the status quo, and this conclusion is
H4: GPPK —> PCE —> ATT Yes
consistent with previous views (Park and Sohn, 2018).

public. 7.1. Academic contributions

However, GPP can indeed affect consumers. One of the effects is that
consumers who have more GPP knowledge have a higher perceived value The academic contributions of this study are as follows.
towards green consumption, which leads them to prefer this behaviour. First, this study has extended the research on the potential effec-
This is consistent with the view of Grandia et al. (2015), in which only tiveness of GPP into sustainable development of the entire society. This
one's own inherent belief that sustainable procurement is beneficial will study is different from the previous focus on the direct stakeholders in
encourage individuals to increase sustainable procurement behaviour. GPP (Nissinen et al., 2009; Li and Geiser, 2005), but instead used the
These benefits include not only the functional value of environmental individual consumers, who the most to the sustainable development of
protection brought by the purchase of green products (Zhang et al., 2018) society (Chan, 2001) are most widespread group in society, as the
but also some emotional and social values. Consumers with GPP research object, with the aim of exploring the impact of GPP as a socially
knowledge are more aware of the strategic vision of the authorities responsible environmental policy on consumers' green consumption at-
(Grandia et al., 2015), and then they feel happy and proud because they titudes. The results reveal that policy makers’ expectations for GPP are
consume green products and follow national policies. An addition, con- optimistic, which also provides an incentive for the public authority to
sumers can realize through GPP that they can contribute to the sustain- actively disseminate GPP knowledge to the public.
able development of society, this social value can be seen as guiding Second, this study verifies GPP's new incentive to green production
behaviour, and people justify their practices against these values from the perspective of spreading knowledge. Previous studies have
confirmed that GPP incentivizes green production among enterprises

6
Q. Wang et al. Cleaner and Responsible Consumption 3 (2021) 100035

through purchasing power of the public sector and knowledge sharing of typically quite willing to accept new ideas and new things. Moreover,
green procurement (Murray, 2000; Ho et al., 2010). However, con- they will be the main force of green consumption in the future (Lee, 2014;
sumer's demand is also important for corporate green production, and the Pacheco-Blanco and Bastante-Ceca, 2016). With the exception of a few
government should also take some measures to strengthen consumers' private universities, most Chinese universities are established and
preference for green products (Nikolaou and Loizou, 2015). This study maintained by the public authority, who themselves are purchasers of
has verified that GPP, as a government-oriented behaviour, can indeed GPP. As the most populous group, college students can be easily targeted
play a guiding and exemplary role in individual green consumption (Liu for education about GPP. It is even feasible to offer an elective course on
et al., 2019a). This conclusion are shown in Fig. 2. GPP or to organize knowledge competitions about GPP within the school
As shown in Fig. 2, this conclusion adds a new approach to the impact of economics and management.
of GPP on enterprise green production. That is to say, GPP can improve Finally, enterprises should magnify the publicity of GPP. Social
consumers’ green consumption attitude by passing on knowledge to observation can be a crucial way to study or imitate (Buenstorf and
them. Consumers with high green consumption attitude will increase the Cordes, 2008). Therefore, the environmental standards of products have
demand for green products, thus prompting enterprises to produce green gradually become one of the common marketing methods of manufac-
products, thus leading to an increase in the market share of green turers, and as such, these manufacturers can educate the public and in-
products. This is similar to the research conclusion of Ma et al. (2021) on fluence them to engage in green consumption (Ho et al., 2010). For
the promotion of enterprise environmental certification by GPP. All these example, in China, there are energy-saving labels and environmental
conclusions suggest that GPP can promote the healthy development of labelling product certification, etc. for products and manufacturers,
the green market, rather than just purchasing green goods. respectively. The GPP list, which requires strict adherence to the most
Finally, this study supports the contention that the involvement of the authoritative environmental standards, is jointly evaluated by the four
government in environmental issues involves not only exerting pressure major agencies, i.e., the Ministry of Finance, the National Development
but disseminating critical knowledge. This paper builds on a previous and Reform Commission, the China Quality Certification Center, and the
study (Grandia, 2016) by extending the influence of GPP knowledge from Chinese Government Procurement Network. The latest list issued (July
the procurement officials to individuals and provides new evidence that 2018, Issue 24) includes more than 400,000 green products involving all
GPP contributes to the environment in ways that are not policy driven. aspects of daily consumption. To achieve better marketing and to instruct
consumers and promote environmental policies, manufacturers advertise
that “the product has been selected and is on the GPP list” (Ho et al.,
7.2. Practical implications 2010).

With respect to GPP, the role of policy makers is to develop and 8. Limitations and future research
implement favorable social pressures to stimulate the intentions of the
public to purchase green products, and the effect must be long-term (Paul This study also has certain limitations that must be noted. Although
et al., 2016). Based on the empirical results, this study suggests that GPP has been implemented in China for more than ten years (Liu et al.,
policy makers can also popularize and disseminate knowledge relevant to 2019b), the majority of people exhibit only a limited understanding of
GPP to promote public awareness of GPP. GPP. However, as we can only briefly introduce GPP-related knowledge
First, increasing the ways by which GPP information is disseminated to the interviewees through the questionnaires, the data may not reflect
should be introduced. At present, GPP-related information is only pub- reality completely. If GPP is better publicized and popularized in China in
lished on specific public procurement websites in China. Hence, it is the future, this problem will be solved. Nonetheless, the results of the
difficult for the majority of the public to learn about GPP, a factor that analysis indicate that the survey respondents are highly educated, which
obviously hinders their understanding of GPP. It is suggested that the may because highly educated individuals use the Internet more often,
government release relevant news about GPP to the newspapers, radios, pay more attention to environmental issues and policies, and are more
and TV stations and that regular community activities be held where GPP willing to participate in surveys (Wang et al., 2019). Hence, there may be
information is shared (Ho et al., 2010). Particularly, the news media bias associated with this study.
should be fully engaged in the effort to spread GPP information (Lee, With respect to future research, it is recommended that GPP research
2014). These efforts will then gradually acquaint the public with the continue in developing countries (Ho et al., 2010). With the continuous
concept of GPP. development of GPP in China, whether such development will result in
Second, there should be a focus on GPP education in the colleges and the innovation of public procurement rules as in developed countries,
universities. Since university education is an important stage in affecting such as the reform of procurement methods (Winden and Carvalho,
the approach of the next generation respond to challenges, it is of great 2019) and the introduction of life cycle costs (LCC) (Giacomoa et al.,
significance for promoting the sustainable development of society (Barth 2019), remains uncertain and is an issue for future discussion.
et al., 2014). College students are young educated consumers who are

Fig. 2. GPP's influence path on promoting green production. (For interpretation of the references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the Web
version of this article.)

7
Q. Wang et al. Cleaner and Responsible Consumption 3 (2021) 100035

Additionally, although GPP is an environmental policy whose direct ef- bodies face budget constraint. On the another hand, Chinese GPP policy
fects should be on the environment itself, this aspect of China's envi- are unique, which is different form Europe and America. For more in-
ronmental performance has not yet been thoroughly examined or formation, please refer to Appendix A2 in Liu et al. (2021b).
discussed. Moreover, carbon emissions, which is a common indicator of
environmental performance (Cerutti et al., 2016), should also examined. Declaration of competing interest
Finally, whether the development of GPP will affect the environmental
practices of Chinese enterprises, such as green supply chain management The authors declare no conflict of interest.
(GSCM) or green procurement (Liu et al., 2020), is an issue worth
exploring. Funding
In addition, it should be mentioned that China and other countries
can not be directly compared. On the one hand, in China, a guideline by This work was supported by The National Social Science Fund of
the government will enable the public institutions to draw on financial China [grant number 15XZZ011]; the National Natural Science Foun-
resources to fulfil the respective obligation. In other countries, public dation of China [grant number 71942006].

Appendix A. Questionnaire

Part 1: Basic information survey

See Table A1.

Part 2: Knowledge of green public procurement

Green public procurement (GPP) refers to the procurement activities that public authorities prioritize when purchasing and using products and
services, a practice that is consistent with national environmental standards, to encourage enterprises to engage in good environmental behaviours and
social green consumption. In China, GPP also includes the compulsory or pre-emptive purchases of products in the environmental labelling system,
which includes China's energy-saving certification system and government procurement lists of environmental-labelling and energy-saving products
(Zhu et al., 2013; Liu et al., 2019b). The current situation of GPP in China is presented in Figure A1, and a comparison of the GPP of China and other
developed countries or regions is presented in Table A2.
GPP not only contributes to the reduction of waste-water, air pollution, and solid waste production through various methods, but it saves energy,
beginning with the resource extraction stage all the way through the manufacturing, transportation, product use, and recycling stages. Table A3 presents
the results or the expected results of the implementation of GPP in some countries, and Table A4 displays the types of goods mainly contributing to GPP
in China.

Part 3: Questionnaire

See Table A5.

Table A1
Basic information

Serial number Survey items Options

1 What is your gender? Male

Female
2 How old are you? Under 20
20–30
30–40
40–50
Over 50
3 What is your educational background? High school and below
Junior college
Bachelor
Master
Ph.D
4 What is your job? Student
Staff
Junior manager
Mid manager
Senior/top manager
5 What is your monthly disposable income? Less than 1500
(Units: Yuan) 1500–3000
3000–4500
4500–6000
More than 6000

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Q. Wang et al. Cleaner and Responsible Consumption 3 (2021) 100035

Table A2
Comparison between China and developed countries or regions

Countries and Taiwan, China Finland The Netherlands, Latvia, Hungary, Austria, Belgium, Sweden, Denmark, China (average from
regions (2012) (2010) Lithuania (2010) Romania (2010) Germany (2010) 2012 to 2017)

The proportion of 94.9% 80% 60%–80% 60%–40% 20%–40% 15.08%

GPP

Table A3
The role of GPP in sustainable development

Countries The role of GPP in sustainable development

South Korea Implementation of GPP reduces carbon dioxide equivalent emissions by 3.1 million tons, which is equal to economic savings of approximately 54.5 billion won in
2013.
Norway The green building Visund, procured by Defence Logistics Organization (DLO) in 2015, is expected to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 88% over its service life
compared to standard buildings (Sparrevik et al. 2018).
India Replacing incandescent light bulbs with energy-saving light bulbs will reduce carbon dioxide emissions by approximately 90,000 tons per year in 2020
The European If all EU public authorities would use energy-efficient computers, 830,000 tons of carbon dioxide will not be released into the air; if all sectors purchase green
Union electricity, it was going to reduce gas emissions by 18% in 2003 (Geng and Doberstein 2008).

Table A4
The types of goods mainly involved in GPP in China1

Energy-saving Products Environmental Labeling Product

Fridge Computer Equipment Computer Equipment Household appliances

Air- Input and output devices Lighting device Special purpose vehicle
conditioner
Projector Washing machine Projector Facsimile communication equipment
Water heater Multi-function Printer Duplicator Input and output devices
Lighting Refrigeration and air conditioning Multi-function Printer Beds, tables, chairs and stools
device equipment
Pump Faucet, flush valve Television Sofa, cabinet, shelf, folding screen
Motor Food and cooking machinery Goods vehicle Washbasin, faucet, Toilet fittings
Toilet and shower fittings Passenger car Modular furniture, Household furniture
Transformer, ballast Passenger coach Refrigeration and air conditioning equipment
Television and video equipment Copy paper, Toner cartridge Cotton, chemical fiber, printing and dyeing materials
Plate, cement, coating, plastic and other Scanners, typesetting software, image processing software, network-connected
building products devices and other printing equipment

Table A5
Questionnaire (From “1 ¼ completely disagree” to “5 ¼ completely agree.”)

Variables Serial Survey items Options

number

GPP knowledge (GPPK) 1 I understand the concept of green government procurement. 1 2 3 4 5

2 I understand the scale and current situation of the green procurement in China. 1 2 3 4 5
3 I understand the scale and current situation of green procurement in developed countries or regions. 1 2 3 4 5
Green consumption attitude 4 I like green products 1 2 3 4 5
(ATT) 5 I feel proud when I buy/use green products. 1 2 3 4 5
6 I feel positive toward green products. 1 2 3 4 5
7 I have a favorable attitude toward purchasing green version of a product 1 2 3 4 5
Perceived value of green 8 I get pleasure from consuming green products 1 2 3 4 5
product (PV) 9 Consuming green products helps me to achieve social approval 1 2 3 4 5
10 Consuming green products helps me to see myself better 1 2 3 4 5
Perceived consumer 11 I am aware how my consumption behaviour impacts the environment. 1 2 3 4 5
effectiveness (PCE) 12 I am willing to select only environmentally-friendly products from now on, even if it is inconvenient for 1 2 3 4 5
me.
13 I am willing to make personal sacrifices to enhance the quality of the environment, even if the results do 1 2 3 4 5
not seem so meaningful at the moment.
14 When buying a product, I try my best to consider whether its usage will affect the environment or other 1 2 3 4 5
consumers.
Collectivistic culture (COL) 15 I work hard for the goals of a group, even if it does not result in personal recognition. 1 2 3 4 5
16 I am a cooperative participant in group activities. 1 2 3 4 5
17 I do what is good for most of the people in the group, even if it means that I will receive less. 1 2 3 4 5

1
Available online: http://www.ccgp.gov.cn/zcfg/mof/201904/t20190403_11849836.htm, http://www.ccgp.gov.cn/zcfg/mof/201903/t20190330_11833800.ht
m.

9
Q. Wang et al. Cleaner and Responsible Consumption 3 (2021) 100035

Fig. A1. Current situation of GPP in China

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