A circular economy is a sustainable economic model in which the usefulness of products and materials is sought to be maintained for as long as possible. This means that, unlike a linear economy, where the flow of raw materials is unidirectional, the materials that would become waste at the end of the process are sorted and, if possible, reused in other process (EC, 2020). According to projections of current trends, our energy consumption (biomass, fossil fuels, etc.) is expected to double in 2040, with the result that waste can increase by as much as 70% by 2050. To prevent the black scenario, the European Commission has drafted a Green Deal. The European Green Deal is a strategic priority first outlined in the political guidelines of Commission President, Ursula von der Leyen. On 11 December 2019, the Commission presented a communication on the European Green Deal that sets out a detailed vision to make Europe the first climate-neutral continent by 2050, safeguard biodiversity, establish a circular economy and eliminate pollution, while boosting the competitiveness of European industry and ensuring a just transition for the regions and workers affected. The project aims at promoting and raising the awareness of youth and youth support organizations across EU countries about circular economy fundamentals and zero-waste economy thinking building the circular economy youth networks in project countries. At the current stage circular economy is just becoming a "buzz" word in Latvia, Portugal, Slovenia and Italy and young people are keen to follow zero-waste philosophy in sorting trash, changing purchasing habits and recycling, reusing and reducing waste. Zero-waste trend is having actually a good ground for building society thinking about circular economy as basis for environmental change.By activation of youth and youth support organizations internationally this project will help to open new thinking paradigm nationally and internationally that would be beneficial to local communities in partner countries. International dimension will help participating organizations and youth to learn international experience in circular economy.
Project aimed to 1) collect project related activities/ materials in each partner country; 2) create framework for zero -waste and circular economy capacity building online course; 3) validate this framework with youth participant from 4 countries; 5) create circular economy & zero waste youth network in partner countries. We wanted to promote understanding of youth in our countries about real circular economy cases, help them to detect circular business models to be able to engage in future greener Europe creation.
A circular economy is a sustainable economic model in which the usefulness of products and materials is sought to be maintained for as long as possible. The European Commission has drafted a Green Deal in December 2019. The project aimed at promoting and raising the awareness of youth and youth support organizations across EU countries about circular economy fundamentals and zero-waste economy thinking building the circular economy youth networks in project countries. We wanted youth in Latvia, Portugal, Slovenia and Italy to follow zero-waste philosophy in sorting trash, changing purchasing habits and recycling, reusing and reducing waste. Zero-waste trend is having actually a good ground for building society thinking about circular economy as basis for environmental change.By activation of youth and youth support organizations internationally this project helped to open new thinking paradigm nationally and internationally that would be beneficial to local communities in partner countries. The youth needs were to follow real case studies to learn in practice circular economy cases and exchange experience in this field.