Thanks to the North-East Regional Development Agency, several activities were implemented in the North-East region of Romania in the frame of the RETRACE project.
Knowledge and skills
As far as the members of the project team were concerned, by deepening the concept of circular economy and through a better understanding of the concept of systemic design as the method that facilitates the transition to the circular economy has led to the inclusion of the 2nd NACE code among the eligibility criteria for investment projects, under the calls for proposals launched for the Priority Axis 2 (PA2) of the Regional Operational Program (ROP) 2014-2020, provided that it was not supported before under this PA. The result was that 10 projects were funded under ROP 2014-2020, PA 2.1, targeted on Circular Economy.
Involvement of local stakeholders
The regional stakeholder group consisted of 19 institutions/organizations relevant to the objectives of the project. A number of 9 persons, representatives nominated by the stakeholders, participated to the Field Visits organized during Phase 1 of the project acquiring various models and good practices in the field of circular economy and systemic design from project partner regions.
On the other side, there were 9 dissemination events for potential beneficiaries (SMEs) organized under the Regional Operational Programme 2014-2020, where a specific accent and focused was put on the importance of including Circular Economy elements into the future projects.
The stakeholders were involved as well in other technical activities of the project as consultation group as following: elaboration of territorial analysis, elaboration of Policy Gaps matrix, elaboration of the Regional Action Plan and its annexes as well as of the policy brief. The RAP’s actions have been discussed with the stakeholders targeted by the specific actions and agreed accordingly. There were 2 stakeholders meetings envisaged by the final definition of the RAP on 20.10.2017 and 22.03.2018 in Moinesti, at the same time when the MONTPESA Association held its General Assembly meetings. The stakeholders also contributed to the best practice database on Interreg Europe website by drafting the information on the 2 practices uploaded 2: Katty Fashion SRL and Brikstone Constructions SA.
Improvements in the framework of Circular Economy in the Region
MONTPESA Tourism Development Association in Moinesti was created and has adopted the concept of circular economy and systemic design as a new way of economic recovery of the area involving composed of 2 municipalities, 2 balneoclimateric resorts and 4 communes.
