Environmentalism has been rated one of the top issues of the new millennium. It certainly is a topic nobody can evade right now. While companies are asking how they can go green, outsourcers are among those who will have to provide answers. Issues like ethical and social responsibility have become buzzwords, yet the global economic climate is forcing company heads and investors to work more economically than ever. Luckily, outsourcing has the potential to reduce cost and make a company record greener at the same time.

Outsourcing payroll services gives employers the opportunity to use a highly specialized electronic service that will save many a tree’s life over the years and also reduces the use of toner cartridges. Company reports can be viewed online which is also a convenient way to reduce paperwork cluttering up office space. Employees receive receipt codes and bank transfers instead of pay slips and cheques that are slowly eating away at natural resources. Outsourcing Product Development Services can also mean that employees have to travel shorter distances to work which reduces the use of fossil fuel burned in the company’s name. With energy costs steadily rising, reducing the distances employees travel means cutting down on costs and carbon emissions.

The Black Book Of Outsourcing of 2009 concluded that 43% of the 20,000 outsourcing users surveyed would include environmental factors into their decision making when hiring a new outsourcer. 94% would include green considerations in renegotiation processes. Experts predicting renegotiations to pick up because of the tense economic climate might expect to see a lot more environmental policies being implemented. Still, many users and suppliers of Product Development Services are paying only lip service to green outsourcing. While out of sight has meant out of mind for many outsourcing users in the past, transparency movements and the easy accessibility of information on the internet is increasingly linking companies with outsourcers and their carbon emissions. If being environmentally unfriendly continues to kill the mood for customers like it currently does real life changes are not too far away.

While using outsourcing providers can help a company cut down on their real use of natural resources, it increases the use of a different commodity. The internet is the singular new resource that is fuelling the outsourcing industry. While it might be invisible as such, its physical infrastructure is not. The rise of the internet started billions of servers humming and lit up even more LCD screens all over the world. The consequence is a growing garbage pile of used electronics and an increased demand for electricity. The solution to the problem might be budding trend green IT, maximizing PCs’ and servers’ life span and energy efficiency as well as working on recycling schemes for used electronics.

Faced with a growing demand, outsourcers are expected to implement more and more green IT schemes in the future, making outsourced Product Development Services a more sustainable and environmentally friendly process in the future.