The second Circular City Centre (C3) webinar in the morning of 17 May will focus on circular city actions and solutions. A new C3 guidance document on this topic will be presented and cities will share information and experiences about their circular actions and initiatives.
The slow flower movement is growing in Europe and aims to provide local, seasonal and organic flowers. Why? Because the international flower industry is very harmful to nature and has major negative impacts in developing countries.
The European Commission is preparing a legislative proposal on the Right to Repair, headed “Sustainable consumption of goods – promoting repair and reuse”. The overall goal of the initiative is to extend the time during which consumers use the product before discarding it.
The public consultation and call for evidence are currently ongoing and will run until 5 April 2022.
Clear Fashion, independant expert of garment evaluation, is a solution that informs consumers on brands' practices and clothes' impact, and enables fashion brands to communicate their scores, in order to bring more transparency in the fashion industry.
The goal of the circular economy is to take full advantage of all available resources through reducing, reusing, repairing and recycling. The recent Nordic Circular Summit in Copenhagen covered topics from public administration programmes to innovative techniques and renewable practices in the marine and food industries.
What can we learn about the circular economy from the Nordic perspective? Find some answers in this position paper.
In this panel discussion, founders of circular enterprises will get the audience up to date on the latest trends, challenges and innovations in the sector.
In 2021, the Leadership Group on Retailers, Consumers and Skills considered issues such as how to made the electronics sector more circular, how to boost public awareness of the need to become more circular and how to step up training with a view to reskilling and upskilling.
While the circular economy is widely discussed, there are still numerous challenges to ensure that the current innovations and models can be upscaled and mainstreamed. Closing the loops will require substantial investments, a total shift in how we do business and consume, and many policy enablers.
Where should we set the priorities to close these loops? How can standardisation support circular design without hampering innovation? What are the essential criteria to be developed for improving the design of our products without other environmental trade-offs?
EuroCommerce, EIT Community Circular Economy and the ECESP invite you to actively engage with stakeholders in discussing the fundamental principles and circular design as drivers for the uptake of the circular economy on 29 November, at 11:30 CET.
Lack of standards in meeting sustainability goals may open the door to greenwashing or misallocation of assets and could lead to a lack of trust in progress towards SDGs. At the webinar on Standards4SDGs on 17 November, you will get an overview of how international organisations have already developed standards that can be linked to policies related to the circular economy, resource efficiency, environmental management and social responsibility, providing a level playing field for standards adopters.
The European Commission has launched a public consultation on the rules on compensation for damage caused by defective products. A specific focus will be on the use of artificial intelligence in products and services. You can take part in this consultation until 10 January 2022, thus contributing to the process of further developing and fine-tuning this initiative.
The new EU Ecolabel criteria for cosmetics and animal care products will soon be here! It is the moment for industry, consumers, and pet lovers to join the green transition and the zero pollution ambition.
The roadmap Policy Framework on biobased, biodegradable and compostable plastics has been published on the European Commission’s portal. You are welcome to give your feedback on it until 27 October!
Consumer electronics, computers, laptops, TVs, tablets, gaming consoles, wearables, cameras etc., have become an essential part of our daily lives, with smartphones representing most retail sales. In the context of increased digitalisation, our reliance on these devices is likely to increase. But, how to address the critical environmental, societal and behavioural challenges to reduce their overall impact in the coming years? How to define the clear responsibility and opportunity of each actor when their roles are constantly changing?
EuroCommerce, the Collaborating Centre on Sustainable Consumption and Production (CSCP), the European Environment Agency and the ECESP invite you, on 19 October at 11:00 CEST, to this #EUCircularTalks to discuss the role and responsibility of electronic retailers to support the circular economy.
According to the UN, in 2021 each person on the planet will produce on average 7.6 kg of e-waste, meaning that a massive 57.4 million tonnes will be generated worldwide. Only 17.4% of this electronic waste, containing a mixture of harmful substances and precious materials, will be recorded as being properly collected, processed and recycled.
Many initiatives are underway to tackle this growing concern, but none of them can be fully effective unless consumers are properly informed and really play their part. This year’s International E-Waste Day will focus on the crucial part each of us has to play in making circularity a reality for e-products.
France’s Anti-waste and Circular Economy Law is a great example of cross-sectoral collaboration. Policymakers, municipalities, NGOs and businesses worked together with the public administration to identify a richer range of needs, solutions, and policy measures. As a result, the law is ambitious and contributes to a system-wide transition towards a circular economy.
This case study by the Ellen MacArthur Foundation is part of a series of case studies that exemplify elements of the Universal circular economy policy goals (2021) in practice.
As part of the Circular Economy Action Plan, the European Commission is developing two key policies on transparency: the Substantiating Green Claims Initiative and the Empowering Consumers Initiative, which will require companies to substantiate claims they make about the environmental footprint of their products/services and will help consumers to play their role in a green transition.
In light of this, the Policy Hub is willing to organise on 14 September a webinar co-hosted with Delara Burkhardt, a Member of the European Parliament to discuss what is needed for an effective policy framework on transparency. At the same time, the event will mark the launch of the Policy Hub’s position paper on transparency reflecting on the key recommendations from the apparel and footwear industry.
Welcome to the circular economy event of the year, World Circular Economy Forum 2021, on 13-15 September 2021!
Hosted for the first time in North America, WCEF 2021 will focus on the system level changes, or “game changers,” needed to accelerate the transition to a circular economy.
18 Italian Consumer Associations sponsored by Eni have identified the challenges to be tackled and the actions to be implemented in order to empower consumers for the circular economy transition in a document titled Circular Consumption Charter.
According to the Charter, circular consumption should be:
Proposed actions
For more information click here.
Interested in contributing to EU efforts to fight food loss and waste? Don’t miss the opportunity to submit your application!
The Commission is calling for applications from private sector organisations with expertise and proven track record in food waste prevention to re-establish, together with public entities, the EU Platform on Food Losses and Food Waste for its second mandate (2022-2026).
The Conference on the Future of Europe is collecting ideas on how to use resources more efficiently in a circular economy. As well as sharing your own ideas, you can also find other ideas from across Europe.
The Ressourcerie Namuroise in Belgium provides collection and processing services for bulky household waste, while also helping people with scant marketable skills to break into the labour market. In 2017, the cooperative established a partnership with Namur's waste management authority, which enabled municipalities to outsource the collection of bulky items with a view to their reuse.
Based in the Danish capital Copenhagen, Veras operates several initiatives to reduce waste in the fashion sector by making it easy for everyone to swap and sell clothes. Veras is primarily an online webshop shipping to all Europe, where users can send in their own clothes. It also hosts weekly clothing markets for everyone to buy and sell clothing and has a flagship store in Copenhagen.
Splosh sells its range of products – from detergents and fabric softeners to shower gel and hand wash – in bottles that can be refilled from their concentrated refill pouches. Buying refills in these pouches cuts plastic waste by 95%.
Imagine Circularity is a new global initiative aiming to reach one million people in Europe and beyond. At its core is a short survey which exposes all participants to the basics of a circular economy, educates them and gathers their views and perceptions of circularity.
Precious plastic is a community platform launched in the Netherlands in 2012, that brings together the solutions needed to tackle the problem of plastic waste: the people, the machines, the knowledge, the techniques, etc. The platform aims to reduce plastic waste by boosting recycling, promoting new biodegradable materials or by adopting zero waste lifestyles.
As an open source project, all the information, code, drawings and source material contributed is made freely available online under Creative Commons licenses. The platform brings together plastic waste collection points, recycling workspaces for people to access equipment and machinery, a community of people to share knowledge, and a global network for collective action.
EU Green Week 2021 has chosen to focus on Zero Pollution for healthier people and planet. You are welcome to joint the virtual High Level Conference taking place on 1-4 June.
Reducing pollution goes hand in hand with achieving our climate neutrality and biodiversity objectives and will help to transform the EU into a clean and circular economy.
Join the TCO Certified webinar Sustainable IT purchasing trends and the road forward on 19 May 2021 from 3 to 4 p.m. CEST to get some inspiration on how you can take action for more sustainable IT in your organisation.
