LIFE Waste to Resources Networking Event

Bes­im Hox­ha (Deputy man­ag­er) and Dag­mara Bunt­ner (Mon­i­tor­ing spe­cial­ist) par­tic­i­pat­ed in the net­work­ing event organ­ised by the LIFE Waste to Resources IP in Riga, Latvia, on Novem­ber 4–5, 2024. The event gath­ered lead­ing Euro­pean LIFE pro­gram projects and waste indus­try pro­fes­sion­als from coun­tries like Greece, Fin­land, Bel­gium, and Poland. The event focused on reduc­ing plas­tic waste, enhanc­ing sus­tain­able recy­cling, and advanc­ing the cir­cu­lar econ­o­my. Par­tic­i­pants shared expe­ri­ences, chal­lenges, and solu­tions relat­ed to sus­tain­able waste man­age­ment and resource reuse, with the col­lec­tive goal of fos­ter­ing a clean­er, more sus­tain­able envi­ron­ment.

On the first day, atten­dees pre­sent­ed actions tak­en by their respec­tive projects and dis­cussed mea­sures to reduce waste gen­er­a­tion, improve waste sort­ing, and raise pub­lic aware­ness. Rep­re­sen­ta­tives from Finland’s Plas­tLIFE, Poland’s plas­ti­cLIFE­cy­cle, Belgium’s LIFE-IP C‑MARTLife, and Greece’s LIFE IP CEI Greece high­light­ed inno­v­a­tive strate­gies, such as pro­hibit­ing recy­cling of reusable items and ensur­ing waste remains in cir­cu­la­tion as long as pos­si­ble. Lat­vian expert Prof. Dr.sc.ing. San­dra Muižniece-Brasa­va pro­vid­ed insights into sus­tain­able plas­tic pack­ag­ing pro­duc­tion, pre­sent­ing cut­ting-edge inno­va­tions that reduce waste and pro­mote mate­r­i­al sus­tain­abil­i­ty.

The sec­ond day show­cased spe­cif­ic ini­tia­tives, includ­ing Latvia’s waste gasi­fi­ca­tion pro­to­type that con­verts mixed waste into fuel and syn­thet­ic gas, a key step in resource-effi­cient recy­cling. Finland’s Plas­tLIFE empha­sized pub­lic edu­ca­tion cam­paigns and alter­na­tives to con­ven­tion­al plas­tics, while Poland’s plas­ti­cLIFE­cy­cle intro­duced new stan­dards for plas­tic recy­cling and ener­gy-effi­cient recov­ery meth­ods. Belgium’s LIFE-IP C‑MARTLife and Greece’s LIFE IP CEI Greece explored cir­cu­lar econ­o­my prin­ci­ples, includ­ing a “pay as you throw” sys­tem and spe­cial­ized haz­ardous waste bins to encour­age active pub­lic involve­ment.