Conference: Organic Waste in Urban Environments - New European Challenges
Brussels, Committee of the Regions
20-21 Nov. 2008
Organized by:
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In collaboration with:
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View this page in: French - Dutch - Spanish
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Now available: PROCEEDINGS
The agreement on the new Waste Framework-Directive voted by the European Parliament on 17 June 2008 sets out a number of new rules for Member States, such as putting together binding national programmes on waste prevention as well as achieving reuse and recycling targets by 2020. Besides, regarding the management of organic waste, the new Framework-Directive encourages Member States to organise the separate collection of organic waste in order to compost it or digest it and to treat it in a way that fulfils a high level of environmental protection.
In order to promote information exchange about how to implement the new European rules and to foster the debate at European level, particularly about the appropriateness of concrete actions for waste prevention and recycling, ACR+ (the Association of Cities and Regions for Recycling and sustainable Resource management) and Bruxelles Environment (the Environment Administration of the Brussels-Capital Region) held an international conference on “Organic Waste in Urban Environments” on 20 & 21 November 2008.
This event was supported by the Minister for the Environment of the Brussels-Capital Region Ms Evelyne Huytebroeck and by the Committee of the Regions; it was organised in cooperation with CEMR (Council of European Municipalities and Regions) and ICLEI (Local Governments for Sustainability).
Programme Highlights:
3 thematic sessions:
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Organic waste and climate change
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Reduction at source of kitchen and garden waste
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Collection and treatment of kitchen and garden waste
Closing session
A closing session about the European policy on organic waste
prevention and recycling featured high-level
representatives from various regions, from the European
Commission and the Committee of the Regions.
These gave their insight on the following issues:
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What is the new Framework-Directive going to bring in ?
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Which additional legal measures do we need on organic waste ?
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How to support a European Week on Waste Reduction ?
Languages: French – English – Dutch
Side Events
There will be a number of events alongside the conference:
- The pilot edition of the European Week for Waste Reduction was presented at a press conference which took place on 18 November at 2pm at Tours & Taxis (Brussels), together with the opening of an exhibition organized by the Brussels-Capital Region in the framework of the exhibition "It's our Earth!".
- The 2008 General Assembly of ACR+ took place on 20 November in the morning.
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This conference endeavoured to be a model in terms of CO2 impact :
- Focus on preventing and limiting CO2 emissions
- Analysis of the results
- Open communication about how to do even better.More information