To accelerate the just transition to an inclusive, circular and sustainable economy in Africa which is in line with global climate change ambitious and the UN Sustainable Development Goals and promotes an economy within social and planetary boundaries.
In Summary
Capacity Building
Some African countries have established networks of research professionals and access to local expertise, but CE-specific related knowledge and capacity are underdeveloped across the continent. As such, there is a significant need for CE education and research as well as for the transfer of findings to the private sector.
- We want to develop specific CE classes and trainings at universities and to give the best students the possibility to start working in the field (making the link to the public and private sectors).
- In collaboration with local universities, we are also establishing training material for companies and the public sector (including finance sector) in order to reach all relevant stakeholders and advance their individual capacity building. These are both distributed through in-person or digital courses.
- We will help to establish new partnerships between European and African universities and higher education institutes to facilitate the sharing of knowledge and skills around CE and to increase awareness in this area. This will go hand in hand with promoting international exchange programs with a particular focus on CE.
- We will encourage and facilitate transfer knowledge and best practices already available in Europe (of universities, research and innovation institutes, companies) to African research organisations (and businesses).
- We will help to set-up incubators aimed at joint research and developments of technologies that can be adopted in the local African context.
- We will promote the transfer of CE research from academia and knowledge institutes to the private sector.
Knowledge Transfer & collaboration
Establishing a pool of CE experts working in or with businesses, governments, academia and civil society to undertake CE activities including research and implementation projects. This is based on the ACEN network.
ACEN Country Representatives and Chapter Members are eligible to apply to join the Circular Economy Expert Database and so be considered for inclusion in teams of experts for tender bids. If you would like to apply please complete this online form.
- The professionals present in our expert pool have diverse backgrounds which support our holistic understanding of CE. This requires aligning the growing pool of experts to our philosophy and goals, and especially to an excellent level of CE expertise and knowledge of the global and African status quo. We aim to enhance this through networking and training sessions.
- On demand, our experts will be selected, recruited and proposed to be involved in the CE research or the development and implementation of local CE projects. This can also include projects of a more of political nature, i.e. developing a local Circular Economy Action Plan or implementing new CE policies.
- Based on our experts’ experiences on the ground, we hold monthly meetings in which we consider research projects that address gaps and shortcomings in practice or aim to further explore opportunities for the application of the circular economy principles.
- We also encourage to apply clear metrics to implementation projects. To our experts we provide a toolbox for measuring the social, economic and environmental impacts which is crucial to feed back to funders or policymakers.
Creating a CE platform and meeting space for private and public stakeholders who want to develop CE activities and include them in their agenda.
This space will serve two purposes:
- To connect companies with each other to collaborate and share their experiences on sector- or supply chain-specific bottlenecks or barriers. The same applies for policymakers and their country-specific, political process related or thematic challenges which are aimed to be mitigated through a peer-to-peer exchange.
- To encourage the collaboration of the public and private sector, we assist and facilitate the process of concrete collaboration, e.g. through the design and development of public-private-partnerships (PPPs) or frequently held dialogues.
- Depending on the needs of the stakeholders in relation to CE knowledge, we also apply the mentioned capacity building elements here.
- We involve our local CE experts as facilitators or consultants in follow-up projects to feed in their experiences or to compensate potential lacks of knowledge or skills.
- In order to encourage and to inspire for public-private collaboration, we frequently present best-practice examples.
Practicing close collaboration with policymakers to effectively close the feedback loop. The experiences that we and our experts make on the ground must be fed back to regulators in order to ensure that the right enabling framework for the circular economy to thrive in Africa is established.
This builds upon the strategic relationships established by ACEN.
- On a quarterly basis, we formulate a report of our experiences and ongoing activities that we make publicly available. We will communicate the impact reached and will share what is successfully implemented and what still needs adjustment or support from the public sector.
- As identified in Europe, a clear policy agenda that structures the transition of the circular economy in a country or continent is key to make progress. Therefore, we push for CE roadmaps and action plans at regional and (supra-) national level to be developed. In the process, we offer to involve our experts and revert to the longstanding experiences of Trinomics having led the development of various European and African strategies.
Incubation & business support, especially for (M)SMEs.
There are numerous examples of small CE initiatives. However, they often lack the resources to scale up. With tailored business support, we want to address this challenge. There are two main elements we are applying to do so:
- We connect African (M)SMEs which are applying circular principles with appropriate funders. This requires to clearly work out those aspects of the businesses that are compliant to the eligibility criteria of the funder, and vice versa (which will help to adjust investment criteria and tools to the nature of CE businesses).
- We support entrepreneurs as well as (M)SMEs through knowledge sharing, mentoring and coaching in order to develop more resilient businesses using circular principles. We also grant them access to our platform and expert network to support their CE journey.
Awareness raising
Awareness raising across all stakeholders to regularly communicate the circular economy vision for Africa and achieve a change of mind and behaviour related to consumption, production and trade
- We organize CE activities, conferences and workshops to encourage and facilitate initiatives by stakeholders at local, regional, national and continental level in Africa.
- Based on the outcomes of these elements as well as our projects, we communicate digestible bits to the stakeholders and the general public.
Projects on the regional, national and pan-African level
Alone or within consortia we apply and run projects that unite the before-mentioned objectives and contribute to implement CE on the ground. For the execution of the projects we are collaborating and contracting the local and national CE experts, registered in our CE expert pool/database.
ACEN Country Representatives and Chapter Members are eligible to apply to join the Circular Economy Expert Database and so be considered for inclusion in teams of experts for tender bids. If you would like to apply please complete this online form.
Fundraising to finance the activities and impacts of the ACEN Foundation
Both from Europe and Africa, we constantly work on identifying and applying for funding opportunities.
- Capacity Building
-
Capacity Building
Some African countries have established networks of research professionals and access to local expertise, but CE-specific related knowledge and capacity are underdeveloped across the continent. As such, there is a significant need for CE education and research as well as for the transfer of findings to the private sector.
- We want to develop specific CE classes and trainings at universities and to give the best students the possibility to start working in the field (making the link to the public and private sectors).
- In collaboration with local universities, we are also establishing training material for companies and the public sector (including finance sector) in order to reach all relevant stakeholders and advance their individual capacity building. These are both distributed through in-person or digital courses.
- We will help to establish new partnerships between European and African universities and higher education institutes to facilitate the sharing of knowledge and skills around CE and to increase awareness in this area. This will go hand in hand with promoting international exchange programs with a particular focus on CE.
- We will encourage and facilitate transfer knowledge and best practices already available in Europe (of universities, research and innovation institutes, companies) to African research organisations (and businesses).
- We will help to set-up incubators aimed at joint research and developments of technologies that can be adopted in the local African context.
- We will promote the transfer of CE research from academia and knowledge institutes to the private sector.
- Knowledge Transfer
-
Knowledge Transfer & collaboration
Establishing a pool of CE experts working in or with businesses, governments, academia and civil society to undertake CE activities including research and implementation projects. This is based on the ACEN network.
ACEN Country Representatives and Chapter Members are eligible to apply to join the Circular Economy Expert Database and so be considered for inclusion in teams of experts for tender bids. If you would like to apply please complete this online form.
- The professionals present in our expert pool have diverse backgrounds which support our holistic understanding of CE. This requires aligning the growing pool of experts to our philosophy and goals, and especially to an excellent level of CE expertise and knowledge of the global and African status quo. We aim to enhance this through networking and training sessions.
- On demand, our experts will be selected, recruited and proposed to be involved in the CE research or the development and implementation of local CE projects. This can also include projects of a more of political nature, i.e. developing a local Circular Economy Action Plan or implementing new CE policies.
- Based on our experts’ experiences on the ground, we hold monthly meetings in which we consider research projects that address gaps and shortcomings in practice or aim to further explore opportunities for the application of the circular economy principles.
- We also encourage to apply clear metrics to implementation projects. To our experts we provide a toolbox for measuring the social, economic and environmental impacts which is crucial to feed back to funders or policymakers.
Creating a CE platform and meeting space for private and public stakeholders who want to develop CE activities and include them in their agenda.
This space will serve two purposes:
- To connect companies with each other to collaborate and share their experiences on sector- or supply chain-specific bottlenecks or barriers. The same applies for policymakers and their country-specific, political process related or thematic challenges which are aimed to be mitigated through a peer-to-peer exchange.
- To encourage the collaboration of the public and private sector, we assist and facilitate the process of concrete collaboration, e.g. through the design and development of public-private-partnerships (PPPs) or frequently held dialogues.
- Depending on the needs of the stakeholders in relation to CE knowledge, we also apply the mentioned capacity building elements here.
- We involve our local CE experts as facilitators or consultants in follow-up projects to feed in their experiences or to compensate potential lacks of knowledge or skills.
- In order to encourage and to inspire for public-private collaboration, we frequently present best-practice examples.
Practicing close collaboration with policymakers to effectively close the feedback loop. The experiences that we and our experts make on the ground must be fed back to regulators in order to ensure that the right enabling framework for the circular economy to thrive in Africa is established.
This builds upon the strategic relationships established by ACEN.
- On a quarterly basis, we formulate a report of our experiences and ongoing activities that we make publicly available. We will communicate the impact reached and will share what is successfully implemented and what still needs adjustment or support from the public sector.
- As identified in Europe, a clear policy agenda that structures the transition of the circular economy in a country or continent is key to make progress. Therefore, we push for CE roadmaps and action plans at regional and (supra-) national level to be developed. In the process, we offer to involve our experts and revert to the longstanding experiences of Trinomics having led the development of various European and African strategies.
- Incubation & business support
-
Incubation & business support, especially for (M)SMEs.
There are numerous examples of small CE initiatives. However, they often lack the resources to scale up. With tailored business support, we want to address this challenge. There are two main elements we are applying to do so:
- We connect African (M)SMEs which are applying circular principles with appropriate funders. This requires to clearly work out those aspects of the businesses that are compliant to the eligibility criteria of the funder, and vice versa (which will help to adjust investment criteria and tools to the nature of CE businesses).
- We support entrepreneurs as well as (M)SMEs through knowledge sharing, mentoring and coaching in order to develop more resilient businesses using circular principles. We also grant them access to our platform and expert network to support their CE journey.
- Awareness raising
-
Awareness raising
Awareness raising across all stakeholders to regularly communicate the circular economy vision for Africa and achieve a change of mind and behaviour related to consumption, production and trade
- We organize CE activities, conferences and workshops to encourage and facilitate initiatives by stakeholders at local, regional, national and continental level in Africa.
- Based on the outcomes of these elements as well as our projects, we communicate digestible bits to the stakeholders and the general public.
- Projects
-
Projects on the regional, national and pan-African level
Alone or within consortia we apply and run projects that unite the before-mentioned objectives and contribute to implement CE on the ground. For the execution of the projects we are collaborating and contracting the local and national CE experts, registered in our CE expert pool/database.
ACEN Country Representatives and Chapter Members are eligible to apply to join the Circular Economy Expert Database and so be considered for inclusion in teams of experts for tender bids. If you would like to apply please complete this online form.
- Fundraising
-
Fundraising to finance the activities and impacts of the ACEN Foundation
Both from Europe and Africa, we constantly work on identifying and applying for funding opportunities.
ACEN Foundation was born from the collaboration of:
