US and European customers are including green and environmental criteria in their vendor selection process for outsourcing contracts, according to The Black Book of Outsourcing report from consultancy Brown & Wilson Group. Some 21 per cent of US and European companies with outsource contracts in place have added green policies and performance indicators to their existing outsourcing agreements already during 2007. And about 43 per cent of those companies outsourcing for the first time have included green issues as part of their selection process with 18 per cent including them as part of the contract. Although some 94 per cent of companies claim that they will add green elements to their outsource contract during nenegotiation, only 36 per cent said that they would be implementing a policy of green outsourcing within the next 12 months. The report claims that very few outsourcing companies are differentiating themselves according to their environmental credentials. It predicts that offshore providers in India and China are likely to be the first to market with outwardly green procurement.