European Week for Waste Reduction

The European Week for Waste Reduction was launched as a 3-year

project supported by the LIFE+ Programme of the European Commission until July 2012. It continues to take place in the following years. The 2013 edition of the EWWR took place under the care of Mr. Janez Potocnik, European Commissioner of the Environment. It aims to organize multiple actions during a single week, across Europe, that will raise awareness about waste reduction. Each year, the most outstanding actions are rewarded during an awards ceremony in Brussels at the heart of the European insitutions. Since the beginning of the project, more thatn 20,000 awareness actions on waste prevention have been implemented in the framework of the EWWR.

The next edition of the European Week for Waste Reduction will take place from 21st to 29th November 2020. The chosen theme of this year is 'Invisible Waste'. Prospective participants are asked to come up with actions to reduce, reuse and recycle waste. Participants are to register their proposals with Wasteserv and get a chance to represent Malta in the European Waste Reduction Awards.

The definition of 'Invisible waste' is the large amount of waste generated during the manufacturing process of products. A big share of invisible waste cannot be recyclyed and ends up in landfills and incinerators.

How about collecting all unserviceable phones and chargers instead of throwing them away, dismantle them, and re-use all plastic and metal used within all smartphones. Packaging does not have to be such fancy boxes either! Do you know that to manufacture a smartphone weighing less than 200grams presented in a small package, 86 kilograms of waste is produced?