Red Alimenta is an organisation of volunteers that collects surplus food and delivers it to people in need. The network of volunteers in different neighbourhoods of the city collects and distributes surplus prepared food from restaurants, schools or hospitals.
The Ó Boneco ("rag doll" in Portuguese) project was born out of a desire to design a tailor-made training combining handicrafts and the traditions of the municipality of Valongo in Portugal.
Circulytics is a comprehensive circularity measurement tool which enables companies to measure circularity across their entire operation and identify opportunities to adopt or further embed circular practices.
The project reCIRCULARte started in 2017: three unemployed people decided to reuse, recover and restore second-hand material or objects, giving them new life.
AquaponieBxl is introducing aquaponics across Brussels by building urban farms where vegetables grow on water using fish waste as fertiliser.
The educational project Ecotic Caravan co-financed by LIFE+, ran between 2014 and 2016 and aimed to raise awareness on environmental protection and sustainable development by focusing on efficient management of WEEE waste. The caravan travelled across Romania and was parked in the main squares so that the general public could easily interact. Workshops with school children were also organized.
The caravan program reached over 20,000 persons and the school program more than 50,000 pupils, contributing to the collection of over 10 tons of WEEE.
The German Sustainable Building Council (DGNB) is the German and international knowledge platform for sustainable building, counting more than 1,200 members.
RREUSE is an international network representing social enterprises active in the field of re-use, repair and recycling. Drawing on first-hand experiences of its members, RREUSE's mission is to ensure that policies, innovative partnerships and the sharing of best practices promote and develop the role of social enterprises in the circular economy. At the heart of RREUSE's vision for Europe is circular activities that foster social value, create locally inclusive jobs whilst supporting vulnerable individuals. RREUSE federates 27 members across 25 European countries and the USA.
François-Michel Lambert is a Member of Parliament, having been elected in the 10th constituency of the Bouches-du-Rhône (Southern France).
He is a member of the Sustainable Development and Country Planning Commission at the National Assembly, and also holds the position of President of the France-Cuba Friendship group at the National Assembly.
He is founding President of the Institute for Circular Economy, a multi-stakeholder association composed of 200 members, companies, communities, NGOs, and schools that defines and implements a transformation of our economic model to emerge from a society of waste and move towards the development of an economy focused on the resource, its preservation and its efficient use. The Institute has become the French reference and the main partner of the public authorities.
Mr. Lambert received the Marianne d'Or award for sustainable development for his proactive action in favour of this change of model towards a circular economy.
Simina LAKATOS is founding President of the Institute for Circular Economy and Environment "Ernest Lupan" (IRCEM) since 2012. Simina has economical and technical knowledge, abilities and experience: she holds a B.A. in Economics and a B.A. Honours in Materials and Environment Engineering. She obtained a Doctorate in Engineering and Management in 2011 after defending her thesis on Corporate Social Responsibility.
Simina has been part of the Department of Management and Economical Engineering of UTC since 2011, where she teaches and researches the following areas: Sustainable Development with focus in circular economy, Strategic Management with focus in social economy, Enterprise Assessment and Marketing and International Management, all of which helps her to develop the IRCEM. Her focus is to accelerate, national, regional and EU, the transition towards circularity from the bottom up with concerted actions, developing practical and scalable solutions, organized local-regional-EU campaigns, communicating and involving others in the dissemination of the circular economy information and sustainable development message. Simina is Romanian and is fluent in English and Italian.
Romina Giovannetti joined Ecoembes in 2019 as Head of EU Public Affairs. She has 20 years of public policy and communications experience in Brussels, together with a track record in journalism in South America.
Romina previously served as Public Affairs Associate Director at consultancy Weber Shandwick. With an expertise in European funding and industrial and environmental policy she acted as an advisor to a number of associations, corporations and NGOs.
Prior to that, Romina worked with a number of Brussels-based associations, spearheading their employment, sustainability and transport dossiers. She spent the early part of her career as a news reporter and editor at Argentina’s leading media group Clarín.
Ecoembes is a non-profit organization that cares for the environment through recycling and the eco-design of packaging in Spain. While implementing the Extender Producer Responsibility, it engages with citizens, public authorities and companies, in a collaborative spirit, to improve the environmental impact of household packaging.
By providing life cycle assessment data and information on the End of Life scenarios, the DGNB Navigator facilitates the application of the life cycle assessment method and fosters the use of circular economy suitable construction products.
The DGNB Academy provides professionals from the construction and real estate sectors with up-to-date knowledge on sustainable construction, including circular economy principles which have been made assessable in the DGNB Certification System.
DGNB: The German Sustainable Building Council (DGNB) is a central knowledge platform for sustainable building and provides the world’s most advanced sustainable building certification system which makes Circular Economy aspects measurable and assessable.
8 billion plastic bags end up in the environment in Europe every year. They have dramatic impacts on the environment, and especially on marine ecosystems, killing every year thousands of marine animals, and affecting no less than 260 different species.
At the European Environmental Bureau (EEB) Jean-Pierre is the policy officer responsible for Product Policy and Circular Economy.
The EEB is Europe’s largest network of environmental citizens’ organisations with around 140 organisations in more than 30 countries. Jean-Pierre has a Masters degree in Environmental Policy from Humboldt University Berlin and in Geography from the University of Oxford.
Prior to joining the EEB, Jean-Pierre worked for four years at the Institute for European Environmental Policy (IEEP) in Brussels, as part of their Green Economy programme where he specialised in plastics, market-based instruments and economic indicators. At IEEP he published a number of reports on a range of environmental issues for the European Commission, European Parliament, UN Environment and the OECD.
The Ellen MacArthur Foundation is a UK charity with the aim of accelerating the transition to the circular economy. Since its creation, the charity has emerged as a global thought leader, establishing the circular economy on the agenda of decision makers across business, government and academia.
Carsten Wachholz joined the Foundation in 2020 after two years working for the European Investment Bank on Corporate Responsibility and another four years working for the European Environmental Bureau on the first EU Circular Economy Action Plan. Carsten leads the Foundation's newly established Brussels-based team supporting the development of circular economy policies at EU and international level (e.g. G20, OECD), in close collaboration with the Foundation's systemic initiatives on plastics, fashion and food.
With the help of a network of 21 Food Banks across the country, FBAO recovers surplus food and redistributes it to charitable organizations which assist people in need.