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European Campaign for Waste Reduction
ACR+’s challenge was a European prevention campaign aiming to bring about commitments in favour of waste prevention both at local and the European scale, via:
- Line of action 1: the in-depth gathering of Local and Regional authorities’ experiences and information
- Line of action 2: the set-up of CLUSTERS OF EXPERTS to elaborate indicators
- Line of action 3: the creation of partnerships among public authorities to implement waste prevention on the ground
- Line of action 4: the creation of a European Week for Waste Reduction.
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This Europe-wide Campaign for waste reduction was based on the ambitious but well-founded target of reducing our municipal waste by 100 kg per inhabitant and per year. This objective is theoretically achievable by working on the four main municipal waste streams and developing a range of convincing waste prevention practices based on experience.
Actions for the 4 flows |
Amount (kg) |
potential waste reduction (Kg/inhab./year)* |
Potential reduction CO2 (Kg/inhab/year)** |
| Organic waste : | 220 | 40 | 57 |
| Promote composting at source (at home, local, in green spaces..) |
180 | 30 | 11 |
| Fight against food waste | 30 | 8 | 27 |
| Promote reusable nappies | 10 | 2 | 19 |
| Paper waste: | 100 | 15 | 16 |
| Fight against unwanted flyers or newspapers |
20 | 5 | 5 |
| Encourage dematerialisation (schools and offices) |
80 | 10 | 11 |
| Packaging : | 150 | 25 | 30 |
| Choose products whose packaging can be returned |
35 | 12 | 7 |
| Promote tap water | 6 | 2 | 4 |
| Develop reusable bags | 2 | 1 | 2 |
| Fight against over-packaging | 107 | 10 | 17 |
| Bulky or other waste : | 130 | 20 | 57 |
| Promote reuse of clothes | 8 | 4 | 37 |
| Promote reuse of furniture, WEEE, toys, other bulky waste | 110 | 13 | >20 |
| Fight against excess buying | 12 | 3 | NI |
| TOTALS | 600 | 100 | >160 |
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* Sources : Internal working groups 2006 – ACR+ ** GHG Balance of Prevention Actions, RDC for IBGE-Bruxelles Environnement, January 2007 |
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The “-100 kg European Campaign for Waste Reduction” was based on the following assumptions:
- LRA’s are key actors for Waste reduction?
- LRA’s are main beneficiary of Waste reduction?
- Waste reduction is an essential component of Sustainable Development?
- Waste reduction is possible?
- Waste reduction can be significant?
- Waste reduction can be cost-efficient
But it is certainly not a question of launching a mathematical campaign between cities and regions. Simply, all the campaign’s participants:
- affirmed that they share the conviction that a series of preventative actions, carried out conscientiously on a theoretical mass of 600 kg per inhabitant per year, have a theoretical reduction of quantities of waste of around 100 kg per inhabitant and per year;
- committed themselves to a practical demonstration of this conviction and put into place a series of actions from those suggested by ACR+ as having the potential to bring about waste reduction.
The towns and regions who participate in the campaign benefited from it in several ways :
- Visibility at European level
- The possibility of developing prevention actions together with other towns or regions, and of sharing information, competencies, infrastructure and budgets
- Technical support for the prevention actions, especially through access to information and exchanging experiences
- The possibility of presenting their actions in the field of prevention on ACR+ website, in the section “European Campaign for waste prevention”.
PATRONAGE COMMITTEE
The ACR+ European Campaign for Waste Reduction "- kg" was supported by a number of political representatives across Europe.
