Local authorities showcasing their waste prevention policies

29th June 2016 | Events, News

Towards Zero Waste cities: How local authorities can apply waste prevention policies

The 22nd of June, RREUSE and Zero Waste Europe co-organised a conference on the topic of waste prevention as applied by European local authorities. This conference was held in front of 30 participants in the institution dedicated to those entities in Brussels: The Committee of the Regions.

Contributing to the ongoing debate on a European Circular Economy, this conference was the occasion to showcase two European funded projects aiming at creating synergies and training tools encouraging local authorities to implement waste prevention policies on their territory: LAWPreT and Town to town, people to people .

After an introduction kindly given by Michel Lebrun, Member of the Committee of the Regions, the first session of the conference was dedicated to LAWPreT, an ERASMUS+ funded project aiming at providing waste prevention training tools to Cypriot, Greek and Slovenian local authorities. After a general presentation of the project by Antigone Dalamagas, Director of Ecorec and President of RREUSE, a number of presentations were given by some of the partners of the project. Maya Dimitriadou (CRE. THI. DEV) explained how to define and evaluate the waste prevention needs of local authorities in Greece depending on demographic and geographic criteria. The outcomes of the LAWPreT online platform in Cyprus was then presented by Anni Lambrou (Up to Date). Danilo Ceh  (Scientific research Centre Bistra Ptuj) also presented the good practices applied in Ptuj, Slovenia. Finally, Michal Len (RREUSE) explained the benefits for municipalities to work with social economy enterprises through the social clauses in public tenders.

The second session was dedicated to other projects in Europe dedicated to waste prevention in local authorities and gave the occasion for Philippe Micheaux Naudet (ACR+) to introduce the Circular Europe Network, a platform of best practices on circular economy and resource efficiency from cities and regions, and for Gaëlle Haut (Surfrider Foundation Europe) to show how to reduce the impacts of plastic bags in the municipalities.

The last session introduced “Town to town, people to people – Building a European Culture of Zero Waste” (Europe for Citizens (EACEA) funded project), a networking platform allowing Zero Waste Cities to share good practices and experiences. Joan Marc Simon (Zero Waste Europe) presented the network and then let the Zero Waste Cities showcase those good practices. Gabriele Folli, Environment Councillor of the City of Parma, showed how the amount of waste has been reduced from 300 to 100kg/person in 5 years in his city. Annemie Andries, from the Flemish Authority for Waste Treatment, described the targets which have been implemented at the Flemish level, including a new 7kg/inhabitant re-use target that OVAM needs to achieve by 2022. Finally, Alexandre Garcin from Roubaix (France) and Caroline Van der Steen from Bruges (Belgium) closed the conference by showcasing the good practices applied in their cities. Trying to reduce the amount of food waste per inhabitant, the city of Bruges is cooperating with Komosie via Schenkingsbeurs to provide food surplus to people in need.

You can find all the presentations below, …

Defining and Evaluating the waste prevention needs of Local Authorities in Greece, Maya Dimitriadou, CRE. THI. DEV.

LAWPRET On Line Platform and project results in Cyprus, Anni Lambrou, Up to date

Waste prevention in Slovenia Local Authorities and project results in Slovenia, Danilo Ceh, Scientific research Centre Bistra Ptuj

Circular Europe Network, Philippe Micheaux Naudet, ACR+

“Residual Waste target” a tool for EU policy making that works! Presentation of the Case Study of Parma – From 300 to 100kg/person in 5 years, Gabriele Folli, Environment Councillor for the City of Parma

Targets at the regional level, Annemie Andries, Senior Policy Advisor of OVAM, Flanders

Waste prevention at home: The case of Roubaix, Alexandre Garcin, Deputy Mayor of Roubaix

Zero Food Waste city: The experience of Bruges, Caroline Van der Steen, Director of Stadsecoloog Burges

… as well as some documents related to the LAWPreT project.

Waste Prevention Guide – Basic Information & EU Situation

Waste Prevention Guide Four steps to implement Waste Prevention in my municipality