Evaluating product panels
Foreword
In 1998, the Danish Environmental Protection Agency launched an experiment to set up three product panels. Using the product life cycle approach, the Agency selected a number of market players in the areas of electronics, textiles and goods transport to sit on the individual product panels. The aim of the product panels was to increase the involvement of and cooperation between players as a tool in the Product-Oriented Environmental Initiative.
Generally, the product panels operate within an expansive framework as long as their work meets the overall objective of the Product-Oriented Environmental Initiative to promote the development and sale of relatively cleaner products. The processes and results of the three product panels differ greatly, thus providing a broad and balanced basis of experience for evaluating the panels.
Development-oriented, the evaluation report focuses on giving a critical assessment of the current product panel concept. It is divided into three sections:
 | an assessment of whether work undertaken by the three product panels falls within the framework originally set out for product panel activities |
| an assessment of product panels as a Product-Oriented Environmental Initiative tool |
| a critical analysis of the product panel concept to be used as a basis for recommending adjustments to the concept |
A team of analysts from Oxford Research A/S conducted the evaluation in the period from June to October 2001. The team was headed by Leif Jakobsen, team leader, with the help of Palle Ellemann Knudsen, analyst, Michael Juhler Jensen, chief analyst, and Anne Chabert, researcher. Kim Møller, general manager, also participated in the project as a collaborative partner. The Danish EPA regularly followed the process of preparing this evaluation report, but Oxford Research A/S has sole responsibility for its conclusions and recommendations.