Ready to take action
from 18 to 26 November 2023?

Take Part

How to participate in the EWWR

Don’t hesitate and take part in the EWWR! There are three ways of participating:

If you are a public authority, an association/NGO, a business, an educational establishment, another body or an individual citizen and you are interested in carrying out an awareness-raising action on waste reduction, reuse, recycling or a clean-up during next EWWR

Take part as an ACTION DEVELOPER

If you are an individual or a group and you are interested in participating in an action taking place during the EWWR, find out about actions taking place close to your home.

PARTICIPATE in an action

If you are a public authority competent in the field of waste prevention and you are interested in coordinating the Week in your area…

Become a EWWR COORDINATOR

How to participate (Flow Chart)

Discover all the details to participate in the EWWR by downloading the Q&A guide or watch the video of the Q&A session with the European Coordinator.

Download the guide!

take part as an ACTION DEVELOPER

Because every action counts! Organise and carry out actions on waste prevention, reuse or recycling, with the aim of informing as many people as possible.

EWWR actions take very different forms. Conferences, contests, information booths and exhibitions are just some examples. Looking for inspiration? Visit the Ideas’ Hub.

To become an action developer, simply register your action on the EWWR website. Action developers are classified into five categories:

Public administration and organisation
Association/NGO and body/organisation of public interest
Business/industry
Educational establishment
Citizen(s)

Action developers must commit to a number of principles laid out in the Action Developers’ Participation Charter. Don’t hesitate to contact your local coordinator for more information.

The paper orchestra – Oviedo School of Music (Asturias, Spain), EWWR 2012

Registrations are now closed!

Check the database of actions to explore the activities that took place during the latest edition.

Registrations for EWWR 2024 will open in September 2024.

Apply for the EWWR Awards

Did you know that you may even win an award for your EWWR action? Don’t forget to apply when filling in the registration form!

There are five awards for each action category, plus a European Special Prize for the action that best shows a spirit of European cooperation.

Find out more

Check out our communication tools

A wide range of tools is available to help you promote your action and support you in the organisation. Discover them!

GENERAL EWWR TOOLS (posters, leaflets, information boards & more)
2022 THEMATIC TOOLS
IDEAS HUB

See ALL TOOLS

Participate in our trainings

Several training sessions are held every year to support action developers. Find out more about the upcoming trainings and check out the recordings of previous sessions.

To our TRAININGS

PARTICIPATE in an action!

If you don’t want to organise an action yourself or you didn’t have the chance to do it on time, you can always participate by exploring the existing actions, get in touch with the organisers and join them.

Or maybe you are just curious about what is going on during the EWWR this year!

2018_Mural-organic-paint_Vacarisses_Municipality

Check the ACTIONS DATABASE

Here you can find all the actions registered for the latest edition of the EWWR.

SEARCH the database

EXPLORE the map

Contact your EWWR coordinator

If you wish to get involved in any other way, you can contact the EWWR coordinator responsible for the campaign in your area.

Find your coordinator

take part as a COORDINATOR

Coordinators of the European Week for Waste Reduction are public authorities that have competences in the field of waste management. They act as coordinators of the EWWR at the level of competence they represent in their country. As such, they are responsible for promoting the EWWR on their territory. Furthermore, they ensure the registration, validation and coordination of actions proposed by action developers.

Public authorities can also delegate these tasks to an associate organisation officially appointed to represent them. For countries, regions or areas that are not covered by a national, regional or local coordinator, the EWWR Secretariat acts as coordinator. EWWR coordinators of this year’s edition of the EWWR are listed in the list of coordinators.

2018_Action-Developer_Admin-PA_Aragon_Organisa_organisando_2018

Become a COORDINATOR!

To become a coordinator, you should sign the Coordinators’ Commitment Charter and send it to the EWWR Secretariat (contact@ewwr.eu). By signing the charter, coordinators officially adhere to the objectives of the EWWR, as well as various commitments in the framework of the project.
For more information about the role of a coordinator you can contact the EWWR Secretariat.

Download THE CHARTER

Check the list of coordinators

Is someone already coordinating the EWWR in your area? Contact them and start a collaboration!

View the list of coordinators

Network with public authorities around Europe and beyond

By becoming a coordinator, you will have a unique chance to network and exchange expertise with other public authorities in the waste management sector.

Participate in virtual trainings

The EWWR Secretariat regularly organises training sessions to support coordinators in setting up and implementing the campaign locally. Check out the upcoming training sessions or watch the recording of previous ones.

To the TRAININGS

Lots of actions…

two easy ways to browse them:

Filter the ACTIONS LIST

Navigate the ACTIONS MAP

Thematic Focus

Every year, the EWWR focuses on a different aspect of waste prevention in order to draw attention to high impact areas related to our unsustainable consumption habits as a society.

Check out our themes over the years:

2023: Packaging

2022: Circular and Sustainable Textiles

2021: Circular communities

2020: Invisible waste

2019: Waste education and communication: Change your ways, Reduce your waste!

2018: Hazardous Waste Prevention: Time to detox!

2017: Reuse & Repair: Give it a new life!

2016: Packaging waste

2015: Dematerialisation: doing more with less

2014: Stop food waste

2013: Reuse

While we encourage action developers to focus on the theme of each year’s campaign, actions that concern other waste reduction aspects are welcome and can be implemented during the EWWR even if they are not in line with the thematic focus.

Packaging

2023 Theme

In our everyday life, packaging helps us to contain, protect, transport and even present any kind of goods. It has become present in all the steps of the value chain, from the producer to the consumer. However, packaging has a massive environmental impact. In terms of use of virgin material, 40% of plastics and 50% of paper used in the EU is destined for packaging, while, looking at the final stage of life, it accounts for 36 % of municipal solid waste.

The total packaging waste generation in the EU increased from 66 million tonnes in 2009 to 78.5 million tonnes in 2019 (around 173kg per inhabitant).
The COVID-19 pandemic might have further enhanced the trend due to more internet sales, more sales in supermarkets for food consumed at home instead of restaurants and more take-away/prepared home delivery of food.

Once packaging becomes waste, it’s sorted between recyclable and unrecyclable packaging waste. From 2012 to 2020, the amount of unrecyclable packaging increased. The situation is even more aggravated by a relevant amount of recyclable waste that, due to the lack of recycling infrastructure and the unprofitability of the recycling process, ends up in landfill, nevertheless. Furthermore, a relevant part is even not collected, and this affects the environment, especially the marine one.

To address this situation, in December 2020, the Commission set the goal that all packaging should be reusable or recyclable in an economically feasible way by 2030 with the scope to reduce packaging, over-packaging, and therefore packaging waste. The role of waste prevention is key to reaching the goal.

Why is prevention key to reducing the environmental impact of packaging?

The environmental impact of packaging varies based on the material. Plastic packaging is the most carbon-intensive material, with a total of 1.8 tonnes of CO2e emitted for the lifecycle of one tonne of plastic packaging. It is followed by paper/board and glass, which have emissions of 809 and 565 kg CO2e per tonne, respectively. Wood packaging has 19 kg CO2e net emissions per tonne (source: Eunomia report December 2021 based on EUROSTAT data). The assessment of the Commission’s Early Warning Reports has revealed so far that plastic is the most challenging packaging waste stream, in terms of recycling. The assessment found that 19 Member States might be at risk of missing the 50% recycling target in 2025. The main reasons for not meeting the recycling targets are the low separate collection rates for plastic packaging waste. This clarifies even more how important is to promote packaging waste prevention since recycling, alone, cannot be an answer.

The role of the European Week for Waste Reduction

The European Week of Waste Reduction will focus on packaging for the second time in its history (the first time was during the 2016 edition). Even after 7 years, this topic keeps being key in terms of waste produced, which has not been reduced but pushed forward with the increase of the e-commerce sector. The campaign will raise awareness of the strong environmental impact of packaging, always providing inputs, ideas, and support to promote a more sustainable consumption behavior. The EWWR community will also be guided through the different kinds of packaging and the alternatives that exist to reduce packaging waste.

DOWNLOAD THE THEMATIC COMMUNICATION TOOLS

USEFUL LINKS

Rethink Plastic Campaign, an alliance of leading European NGOs, representing thousands of active groups, supporters and citizens in every EU Member State.
Sustainable alternatives of packaging for food, an article by the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations
Sustainability in packaging, an article by McKinsey&Company
Compostable plastic packaging guidance, by WRAP

Discover all our communication tools

EWWR 2023 – Packaging_EN

REGISTER YOUR CLEAN-UP ACTION!

Let’s Clean Up Europe

A European Clean-Up!
Every year, millions of tonnes of litter end up in oceans, beaches, forests and elsewhere in nature. The primary causes of this littering issue are our society’s unsustainable production and consumption patterns, poor waste management strategies and a lack of awareness of citizens.

Do you want to be part of the solution?
The Let’s Clean Up Europe (LCUE) campaign is active throughout all European countries.

By implementing clean-up actions, you contribute to solving the littering problem but you also raise awareness about the amount of waste produced, the importance of waste prevention and waste reduction! Clean-up actions can be communicated under the LCUE flag!

The LCUE 2023 will be on from 29 April to 26 November!

Are you ready to join this new edition of Let’s Clean Up Europe! (LCUE)? Last year, the campaign welcomed more that 900 clean-up and plogging actions all around Europe! Citizens, volunteers, and all kind of stakeholders took their part by collecting waste in our priceless Planet. LCUE is about raising awareness, community, and fun! It is not our litter, but it is our Home, and we need to cherish it all together.

This edition is again extended and it is possible to register an action held from 29 April to 26 November 2023 to allow all the European countries to adapt the clean-up activities to the local weather conditions.

Once again, it is possible to organize plogging actions – a sport practice that combines run and abandoned waste collection. Discover how to organise a great plogging initiative! Read the guidelines.

Check the actions that are being implemented on the map.

Download the 2023 infographic

Highlights 2022 edition

👉 After a couple of years of pandemic restrictions, the 9^th edition of Let’s Clean Up Europe was characterized by a huge involvement of citizens and associations all over Europe. Mostly located in Spain, Italy, and Portugal, 942 clean-up and plogging actions have been organized in order to help actively the environment, collecting littering and recycling it. The tangible impact of these actions has been shared on the social networks, where the participants posted their images of enthusiasm and joy in cleaning our Planet.

👉 From 29^th April to 27^th November, people from Spain, Italy, Portugal, Serbia, Slovenia, France, the Netherlands, Lithuania, Greece, Malta, Croatia, and Belgium collected littering and cleaned up beaches, parks, and streets.

How to organise a clean-up action?

Identify the problematic place to clean, then get your contacts on board and register your action. If you want to go big you can set up a team and find some support or sponsors.
On the clean-up day it’s time for action! Gather your team and start collecting litter, sorting it as much as possible! Share ideas about the 3Rs: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle. We also have a LCUE factsheet with more details and ideas.
Get more visibility by using our communication tools! You can download them here!
Take pictures and videos of the event, share them on social networks (Facebook and Twitter) using the hashtag #cleanupeurope and send them to serr@envi.info.

Come and join us!
Follow us on social media @LCUEofficial and @LetsCleanUpEU to get the latest updates and to see more inspiring ideas!

Who is coordinating LCUE 2023?
In 2023, the International Association for Environmental Communication in Italy (AICA) acts as a central coordinator for most territories. The contact information is below:
Website: http://www.envi.info/lets-clean-up-europe
Facebook: @LCUEofficial
Twitter: @LetsCleanUpEU, @EnviInfo
Contact: serr@envi.info

There are also regional coordinators:

Catalonia | Coordinator: ARC – Agència de Residus de Catalunya
Website: residus.gencat.cat/letscleanupeurope
Facebook: @residuscat
Twitter: @residuscat
Contact: Mireia Padros setmanaprevencio.arc@gencat.cat
Please note that this coordinator has a separate registration form, which can be accessed on its website.

Balearic Islands | Coordinator: Environment Ministry of the Balearic Islands Government
Website: http://www.caib.es/sites/puntdinformacioambiental/ca/pagina_inicial-57096/?campa=yes
Contact: pia@dgqal.caib.es;

Greece | Coordinator: HELMEPA – Environmental Awareness Center
Website: https://www.helmepa.gr/en
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Helmepa
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Helmepa
Contact: Eleni Tsolka environment@helmepa.gr