Overview

In cooperation with the Hanseatic City of Rostock, the international urban networking platform Connective Cities and its initiators, the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH, the German Association of Cities and Engagement Global / Service Agency Communities in One World, invited German and international stakeholders from Tunisia, Morocco, France, Italy, Zimbabwe, Austria, Albania and Egypt to exchange their experience and showcase their good practices in Rostock from 26 to 28 September. The dialogue event on ‚Planning integrated solid waste management at the municipal level‘ was hosted by the Hanseatic City of Rostock.

The dialogue event attracted German and international municipal actors with first-hand experience in solid waste management including representatives of municipalities, municipal companies as well as representatives from civil society, academia and business, active in municipal projects in this thematic area.

The main objective of the exchange was to showcase examples of good practices on implementing integrated solid waste management in each municipality and to check the regional applicability of the presented solutions. The event in Rostock could furthermore foster learning among participants through discussions of current challenges, such as the involvement of the informal sector and approaches to waste separation and recycling. In smaller working groups, experts and practitioners exchanged views on obstacles that municipalities face in practice and discuss possible solutions.

Keynotes

Dr. Abdallah Nassour, University of Rostock, Germany
Challenges of integrated solid waste management at the local level in emerging countries

Otto Huter, German Association of Cities
Technical Analysis

Results

During this professional exchange, it became clear that even if waste management systems differ significantly among the participating municipalities from both developing and European countries, they mostly face the same challenges such as balancing the degree of involvement of the private sector or raising public awareness.

As part of the event, participants also had the opportunity to visit municipal waste management facilities in the city of Rostock, such as a recycling and environmental management company and a sea port waste sorting and recycling plant.

Based on the insights gained and also the needs of the respective municipalities and stakeholders, the participants decided to work together on four local follow up projects. One project idea focused on the implementation of composting plants, another on creating a new system for handeling e-waste, including collection, reusing and recycling. Moreover, the partciapants explored the idea to promote respect and awareness of young people for resources and waste. Another cooperation was suggested in the field of recycling construction waste.

The participants also explored sustainable and innovative waste management solutions in the Hanseatic City of Rostock that were presented during the event and that provided the practitioners with plenty of stimulating ideas for their daily work and projects.

Video

<link https://www.connective-cities.net/typo3/sysext/cms/layout/db_layout.php?id=437# - - Bearbeiten>Video: Dialogue Event on Solid Waste Management in Rostock