EWWR

The European Week for Waste Reduction (EWWR) is the biggest Europe-wide initiative promoting the implementation of awareness-raising actions about sustainable resource and waste management during a single week. It encourages a wide range of audiences (public authorities, private companies, schools, civil society as well as citizens themselves) to get involved.

Since 1 July 2017 the EWWR is coordinated by the EWWR Steering Committee. The project was originally launched in 2009 under the European Commission’s LIFE+ programme, which co-financed the project until mid-2017.

Highlights

The 9th edition of the EWWR took place as usual during the last week of November, from 18 to 26 November 2017. This year a record number of 13,410 actions coordinated by 40 Coordinators were implemented in 30 different countries.
The EWWR 2016 Awards Ceremony took place on 18 May 2017 at Casa Llotja de Mar in Barcelona as part of the final LIFE+ EWWR International Conference. There, the EWWR Jury rewarded the most outstanding actions of the edition 2016. Six winners were awarded, one in each of the Action Developer categories. They all happily came on stage to accept their well-deserved prizes. Discover the winning actions on the EWWR website.

The EWWR has started a new phase of its history. In June 2017, the financing of the European Commission’s LIFE programme came to an end. To continue its success story, the EWWR set a new European Steering Committee (ESC) which has become the main decision-making body for the campaign.

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle: every action counts!

THE PROJECT

The European Week for Waste Reduction aims to mobilise as many actors as possible to implement awareness raising actions on waste reduction, product reuse and materials recycling.

The actions implemented in the EWWR are addressing the “3Rs”: Reduce waste, Reuse products, Recycle material.

ACR+ is a member of the EWWR Steering Committee and acts as the EWWR Secretariat, coordinating the campaign at European level.

Rvalue

In 2017 the EWWR was coordinated by the EWWR Steering Committee for the first time since the end of the LIFE+ programme financing. In this 9th edition 40 coordinators across 30 countries coordinated and promoted the EWWR on their territory, which resulted in mobilising thousands of Actions Developers that implemented 13,410 actions across Europe and beyond. Every year sees the increase in the number of participants in the EWWR. Including this year’s actions, the EWWR has reached a total of over 87,000 actions implemented since its first edition in 2009.

There are three ways of taking part in the European Week for Waste Reduction:

Participant: individual or a group;
Action Developer: public authority, association, NGO, business, educational establishment, another body or an individual citizen;
EWWR Coordinator: public authority competent in the field of waste prevention.

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.

PARTNERS INVOLVED

In 2017 the EWWR is coordinated by seven EWWR Steering Committee members:

ACR+ - Association of Cities and Regions for sustainable Resource management, acting as the EWWR Technical Secretariat of the EWWR;
A.I.C.A.* - International Association for Environmental Communication in Italy;
A.R.C.* - Catalan Waste Agency in Catalonia, Spain;
Bruxelles Environnement - Leefmilieu Brussel* - public administration for environment and energy in the Brussels Capital Region;
European Commission
VKU - German Association of Local Utilities;
WasteServ Malta*- waste management company in Malta

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

* ACR+ member

Don’t hesitate and take part in the EWWR!

More information www.ewwr.eu