ACTIVITIES

Best practices on waste management during sports events were collected, assessed and tested aiming to realise guidelines as the basis for the awareness actions. The project engaged all the relevant contractors in enduring efforts to prevent and reduce waste during football matches (e.g. food and beverages providers, stadium cleaning operators, tickets sellers etc.). Within National Football Associations (NFAs), adequate competences and organisational structures were developed to guide the diffusion of best practices in the related football leagues and stadiums.

Project activities and results were replicated in non-participating NFAs through the establishment of a specific Replicability Management Board (RMB) coordinated by UEFA.

PARTNERS INVOLVED

LIFE TACLE’s project coordinator was SSSA (Scuola Superiore di Studi Universitari e di Perfezionamento Sant’Anna, IT) and its project partners were:

• ACR+, Association of Cities and Regions for Sustainable Resource Management (BE)
• AMIU*, Azienda Multiservizi d’Igiene Urbana Genova SpA (IT)
• FIGC, Federazione Italiana Giuoco Calcio (IT)
• EURACTIV, EURACTIV.COM PLC (BE)
• Municipality of Heraklion (GR)
• FRF, Federatia Româna de Fotbal (RO)
• LIPOR*, Servicio intermunicipalizado de gestao de residuos do grande Porto (PT)
• SvFF, Svenska Fotbollförbundet (SE)
  * ACR+ member

METHODOLOGY

The following actions have been carried out during the project:

1. Technical updating to identify the legislation in force and to collect environmental information available for urban furniture;
2. Identification of the products of interest falling under the category of “urban furniture”;
3. Development of a database with green public purchase criteria and environmental profiles for these urban furniture products;
4. Graphical design and functionalities implementation of the GUF Tool;
5. Developing an environmental assessment multiple criteria decision-making method for obtaining single scores to evaluate award criteria for green public procurement using TOPSIS;
6. Demonstration and validation of the tool through virtual and real tenders: benches and play-grounds were the selected products for the virtual tendering process.

OUTCOMES

The main result of the project is the GUF Tool. However, other documents have been produced during the project:

• Report on the current situation of the urban furniture sector related to GPP
• Report on the selected products and their specifications (technical description)
• Layman's report
• Final report

It has been showed that the project had positive environmental impact, with a reduction of waste generated and a contribution to decrease global warming. It also had positive socio-economic impacts as the tender generated by the GUF Tool should aim to minimize the impact produced by the transport and distribution of urban furniture products which means that local businesses are favoured. Some of the social impacts are directly targeted by tenders, such as the participation of companies that could employ disabled persons or the fight against illiteracy.

THE GUF TOOL

The GUF Tool is an online tool to support public bodies on the decision making related to the purchase of more environmentally friendly urban furniture. It guides users throughout the whole tender process, from the generation of the environmental requirements that they must include in the call for public tenders to the comparative environmental assessment of the products offered by different suppliers.

It offers two levels of bidding:

• “Silver GUF”: for public administrations willing to merely perform a Green Public Procurement process. The products offered by suppliers only need to comply with the selected mandatory “Specifications” criteria for being accepted in the bidding process.
• “Gold GUF”: for public administrations that want to show a higher level of environmental commitment in the Green Public Procurement process. In addition to fulfil the mandatory “Specifications” criteria, products offered by suppliers are environmentally scored and compared to others using voluntary “Awards” criteria. The results of this comparison allow public administrators to identify those products with better environmental performance.

PARTNERS

LIFE FUTURE’s project coordinator was AIMPLAS (Asociación de Investigación de Materiales Plásticos y Conexas) and its project partners were:
•    ACR+
•    AIJU, Asociación de Investigación de la Industria del Juguete, Conexas y Afines
•    InnDEA, Fundación InnDEA Valencia
•    Koprivnica, City of Koprivnica
•    UJI, Universitat Jaume I

ACTIVITIES

The Circular Europe Network offers access to factsheets focusing on the governance of local or regional circular economy strategies, as well as the different instruments and actions implemented on this territory.

In addition, the Circular Europe Network delivered guidelines on circular economy planning that aim to clarify the circular economy concept and to propose key steps and elements to include in a local or regional circular economy strategy.

This general guidance material is followed and progressively complemented by sectorial guidelines focusing on public procurement, sustainable food and sustainable construction

THE 3Rs

The actions implemented in the EWWR are addressing the “3Rs”: Reduce waste, Reuse products, Recycle material. The “3Rs” represent the options which should be considered first when elaborating a waste management strategy.

Reduce – strict avoidance and reduction at source;
Reuse – reuse and preparing for reuse;
Recycle – waste sorting and recycling.

ACTIVITIES

A broad variety of communication tools has been developed in order to help Coordinators and Action Developers to promote and implement actions in the scope of the EWWR. These tools are available on the EWWR website and include promotional posters, exhibition panels, web banners, shopping lists, a guide of good practices and much more! Targeted communication toolkits have also been designed to help reach specific target groups.

Additionally, each edition of the EWWR focuses on a particular theme. To encourage the implementation of actions on this topic, numerous tools are specifically developed, including various factsheets, support documents and a new poster.

Every year, the EWWR publishes several newsletters and press kits to share its achievements with the European citizens. The latest news about the EWWR can also be found via its Facebook, Twitter and Instagram accounts.

STEERING COMMITTEE

The EWWR is led by the EWWR Steering Committee (ESC). The ESC members for 2021 are:

• ACR+, Association of Cities and Regions for sustainable Resource management (BE), acting as the EWWR Technical Secretariat of the EWWR
• ADEME, French Environment & Energy Management Agency (FR)
• A.I.C.A.*, International Association for Environmental Communication in Italy (IT)
• A.R.C.*, Catalan Waste Agency in Catalonia (ES)
• Balearic Islands, Ministry of the Environment and Territory (ES)
  
• Bruxelles Environnement - Leefmilieu Brussel*, public administration for environment and energy in the Brussels Capital Region (BE)
• EIT Circular Economy Community, consists of five Knowledge and Innovation Communities–  or “KICs” – namely EIT  RawMaterials, EIT Climate-KIC,EIT Food, EIT Manufacturingand EIT Urban Mobility
• EMWR, The Eastern-Midlands regional Waste Office (IE)
• European Commission
• European Committee of the Regions
• Lipor*, Intermunicipal waste management of Greater Porto (PT)
• VKU, German Association of Local Utilities (DE)
• The Principality of Monaco, Environment Directorate (MC)
• WasteServ Malta*, waste management company in Malta (MT)

If you are interesting in joining the EWWR Steering Committee, visit this page.

* ACR+ member