The 6th and final LSG Meeting of the project "SinCE-AFC (Enhancing the Entrepreneurship of SMEs in Circular Economy of the Agri-Food Chain)", co-financed by the INTERREG EUROPE Program, organized by the Regional Development Fund of Central Macedonia, on behalf of the Region of Central Macedonia, together with the Organization for Local Development, ANATOLIKI S.A..
The meeting was held online on Tuesday, 31st of May, 2022. The opening speech was delivered by Mrs. Lambrini Tsoli, from the Department of European Union Projects of the Regional Development Fund of Central Macedonia. Mrs. Tsoli, after welcoming all the involved members of the Local Support Group attended the meeting, made a brief presentation of the topics of the 6th and final LSG meeting, refering to the 1st phase of the SinCE-AFC project.
The first section of the meeting included a thorough presentation of the Regional Action Plan for Central Macedonia, by Mrs. Lambrini Tsoli. This Action Plan incorporates all the units of the ROP of Central Macedonia (2021 – 2027) which has been proposed for impelling change to the existent policies in place, the good practices that have been identified along the territory of the Region of Central Macedonia, those that have been identified in the partnership’s Regions and provided inspiration for its formation and planning and the actions it proposes for implementation. Particularly, the proposed Action is referring to the implementation of a horizontal supporting Mechanism for the entrepreneurship, in relation to circular economy, with the objective to:
- Providing knowledge and raising awareness in businesses and entrepreneurs about the dimensions of circularity and the benefits for business sector,
- Consulting and promoting good practices for making use of by-products,
- Digital tools for the interconnection and depiction of the productive inputs and outputs in divisible sectors, e.g., agri-food chain.
During the meeting, the forthcoming actions regarding the implementation and monitoring of the Action Plan, were thoroughly presented, as having been foreseen within the lifespan of SinCE-AFC project.
The next section of the meeting was dedicated to the presentation of the updated National Action Plan for Circular Economy, which has been approved by Greek Government Gazette 84 A'/3-5-2022, following the lately released EU’s Circular Economy Action Plan and the original version of the National Strategy for Circular Economy provided by the Ministry of Environment and Energy (December 2018) and the National Operational Action Plan 2018-2019.
In the last section of the meeting, Mrs. Vasiliki Papadopoulou, representative of ANATOLIKI S.A., the project’s Lead Partner, presented the results of the 6th Project Meeting, which was held in hybrid mode, in Debrecen, Hungary, on 11st and 12nd of May, 2022. The Project Meeting was of particular interest as it was the final conducted before the completion of SinCE-AFC project’s 1st phase. The lessons learned by each of the partnership’s members during the implementation of the project’s 1st phase, were laid out. Special prominence was given to the difficulties emerged, foremost those related to the cultivation of incentives among stakeholders, collegiate bodies, cooperatives and enterprises. This assisted to the assimilation of concepts related to circular economy and the benefits it offers, when targeting to sustainability in economic, social and environmental terms.
The meeting closed with an open discussion among participants, followed by a brief description of the upcoming actions regarding the 2nd phase of the implementation of SinCE-AFC project until 31/07/2023, when the project ends.
