Business in the Community and other partners of the Interreg North Sea Region ProCirc have recently compiled a Circular Procurement Guide containing six simple steps ‘to begin your circular procurement journey’: 1. define your circular ambitions, 2. determine your functional needs, 3. formulate your questions and communicate with the market, 4. choose your supplier/s and award the contract, 5. implement circular usage policies, 6. evaluate success. In addition, the ACR+ member city of Aalborg shared its experience on circular public procurement practices, also as hosting organization of the Network for Sustainable Business Development North Denmark. Lead experts from ACR+ member Rijkswaterstaat, part of the Dutch Ministry of Infrastructure and Water Management, also recently explained the benefits of circular procurement and how to get started.

In addition, a transnational webinar “The future of ICT: Circular solutions for a post-Covid world”, delivered as part of ProCirc project, took place on 18 March 2021. The event provided a greater understanding of the environmental and financial benefits that can be gained through adapting circular ICT procurement principles. Different case study examples were presented to illustrate how this can be put into practice. Some of the takeaways are to make clear what the organisation objectives are (environmental, economic or social), to take all the lifecycle costs into consideration, to identify available alternatives to buy new, to use the existing experience available, to develop pilots, and to share and collaborate with other. The recording of the webinar is available for you to enjoy it if you missed it.

More opportunities to share good practices and exchange knowledge will come soon, since ACR+ prepared with other ProCirc partners the organization of two events:

• an online seminar “Circular procurement as a way to address pollution: experiences from ProCirc”, taking place on 18 May. This seminar will dive into the world of circular procurement and will focus on sharing knowledge, expertise and lessons learned. After joining this ProCirc event procurers, policymakers and other stakeholders have answers to the following questions: How does the current framework support the development of circular procurement (from legal, policy and practice perspectives)? What are the environmental and financial benefits of circular procurement? How do you measure circular procurement and how do you convince your organization to start with it? You can find the agenda and register to that event on the event webpage.
• A workshop “Circular procurement as a strong instrument to support green transition of European territories”, taking place on 12 October as part of the European Week of Regions and Cities 2021. The event will be a joint activity of ProCirc partners (in particular ACR+, Rijkswaterstaat, Circular Flanders and Malmö), and the networks CEMR and UBC. You can already save the date in your calendar!