Circular economy is becoming an imperative for cities that want to become places where communities can pursue a good life. One of the most common challenges cities face is the overwhelming task of coordinating the many measures, targets, and stakeholders within their administrations.
We have launched the Circular Economy Academy to support municipal circular economy managers with tailored training that matches their needs and helps them advance circularity on the ground. Are you one of them? This programme is for you!
What does the Circular Economy Academy offer
For many cities, appointing dedicated Circular Economy (CE) Managers is a crucial step in driving the circular transformation. In pioneer cities, where such managers are appointed, they are responsible for coordinating the strategic direction and implementation of circular economy measures and thus contributing significantly to sustainable urban development.
But who within a municipality is ready to take on this emerging role and has the know-how to manage its complex, cross-sectoral responsibilities?
Developed by the CSCP in collaboration with the Bergischer Abfallwirtschaftsverband (BAV)/:metabolon, the Circular Economy Academy offers a hands-on, 5-day training programme tailored to the specific needs of municipal CE Managers in NRW and beyond.
Whether working on environmental and climate protection, waste or building management, municipal utilities or economic development agencies—municipality employees with diverse backgrounds will gain knowledge, tools, and networks needed to confidently step into this new role and drive circular transformation in their local context.
“The Academy empowers local actors to become change agents for circular transformation in their own cities—not just by providing knowledge, but by reflecting, connecting, and co-creating hands-on approaches tailored to their local context.”, says Shirin Betzler, CSCP Programme Lead.
What the Circular Academy offers:
In addition, the Circular Economy Academy will strengthen a growing community of municipal CE Managers across NRW and contribute to the state’s strategy to support circular cities through funding initiatives like CircularCities.NRW.
The first round of the academy is planned to start in the third quarter of 2026, combining two in-person workshops (two days each) with additional online sessions. Municipal employees can submit a non-binding expression of interest and will be the first to receive updates once registration opens.
You can find additional information on the academy here.
Ready to drive circular change in your city? Submit your expression of interest now!
For additional questions, please reach out to Dr. Shirin Betzler.
Our VERNE project works closely with key actors and local communities in 10 European countries to support the transition of local and regional tourist destinations toward sustainable and circular models.
To test promising solutions on the ground, five pilots have been launched in representatives locations across Europe. In one of them, a new micro-museum concept is introducing an innovative approach to cultural heritage and circular economy.
A unique museum in a unique region
Sønderjylland–Schleswig is a cross-border region between Denmark and Germany known for its dramatic coastal landscapes along the North and Baltic Seas. The region brings together communities on both sides of the Danish-German border, serving as a hub for cross-border cooperation between the Danish municipalities of Tønder, Aabenraa, Haderslev and Sønderborg, the Regional Council of Southern Denmark, the German districts of Schleswig-Flensburg and Nordfriesland, and the city of Flensburg.
For the pilot in Sønderjylland–Schleswig, the VERNE project has come together with Syddansk Universitet (SDU) to launch the Corporate Museums Sønderjylland–Schleswig, an innovative and sustainable approach to cultural heritage tourism.
What is the museum about?
At its core is the corporate micro-museum concept, which offers local and regional small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) a low-threshold way to employ and communicate their corporate history, organisational identity, and stakeholder relations as cultural attractions, while at the same time promoting circular economy through the use of reused, recycled, and upcycled resources.
Key elements include:
“Our pilot design brings both elements together by connecting the digital and physical layers. It links corporate museum owners, interests, and stakeholders across sectors, creating a shared space to exchange perspectives, knowledge, and best practices, with the common aim of making local heritage accessible to all.”, says Henri Haase, International Project Manager and Pilot Coordinator
Designed as a space for collaboration
The Corporate Museums Sønderjylland–Schleswig is characterized by strong collaboration and active stakeholder engagement. Five Community of Practice events have been held at different corporate museum sites, where participants could gain practical insights through guided tours led by site owners and continue the exchange in workshops, jointly exploring solutions and implementation approaches.
For further questions, please contact Kartika Anggraeni.
This year marks a special milestone for us at the CSCP: we have turned 20!
In our celebratory booklet, we share highlights of this journey and tell our story through the voices of current and former team members as well as our valuable partners, who have walked with us during all these years.
We do this work with great passion and commitment, and our Family & Friends Day was a great opportunity to introduce our friends and families to what we do in practice.
“So many of us are intrinsically motivated by the topics and ideas we work on, but don’t always have the chance to really share what we do with the people outside of our work context. The CSCP Family Day was our playground to explore together with our loved ones what we do as part of our work.”, says Nils Kreft, who works as Communication Coordinator at the CSCP.
The organising team brought together an impressive programme with the most exciting, engaging, and fun activities and projects that we have done and are doing at the CSCP and the co-do lab.
“It was so nice seeing our beautiful offices in the former Huppertsberg factory in Wuppertal buzz with so many people. Especially seeing the children, was a powerful reminder who we do this work for and why.”, shares Dr. Flandra Syla-Beqiri, who works as Senior Communication Manager at the CSCP.
Different stations covered different topics of our work: from food (waste) and circular economy to digitalisation and sustainable lifestyles, there was something for everyone.
“In one of our offices, adults could take the Lifestyle Test; outside, children could draw the future; and everyone could experience our live infographics, engage on circular economy through swapping items, or get a taste of the future in the era of AI.”, says Livia El-Khawad, CSCP Project Manager.
Our Family & Friends Day allowed us to grow together as a team even more as we had the opportunity to meet the important people in our colleagues’ lives, talk to them, and do what people do on birthdays: enjoy the atmosphere with good food, music, and sunshine.
You have a question or would like to engage with us? Get in touch with Dr. Flandra Syla-Beqiri!
Many local actors find themselves grappling with the same challenge: while innovative circular initiatives are emerging everywhere, opportunities to learn from one another and build on existing experiences remain limited. With the launch of the Community of Practice (CoP) Circular Cities NRW, we are aiming to fill this gap.
As part of the Community of Practice we are bringing together municipalities, researchers, businesses, public authorities, and civil society organisations to exchange experiences, co-develop solutions, and accelerate the circular transition of cities across North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW).
How CoP NRW came into being
The need for such a platform became increasingly apparent through the Circular Cities thematic working group established in 2024 as part of North Rhine-Westphalia’s Round Table on Circular Value Creation. Participants repeatedly expressed interest for deeper collaboration, more continuity, and practical formats that go beyond one-off exchanges.
At the CoP’s kick-off meeting in Düsseldorf, Germany around 30 participants from municipal administrations, research institutions, the NRW state government, chambers of commerce and skilled crafts (IHK/HWK), and civil society organisations came together to explore how a stronger community could help advance circular city development in practice.
What we are learning
Dr. Shirin Betzler, who manages the project from the CSCP side, shares that what stands out is not only the diversity of perspectives in the room, but also the remarkably high level of engagement.
“Discussions quickly moved beyond general ambitions and focused on concrete challenges participants face in their daily work—from engaging stakeholders and breaking down silos within organisations to identifying practical governance approaches, financing mechanisms, and ways of communicating circular economy concepts to different audiences.”, says Shirin.
What the Community of Practice participants are saying
For the Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Transport of North Rhine-Westphalia (MUNV), the initiative represents an important contribution to strengthening circular economy implementation across the state.
“For North Rhine-Westphalia, the circular economy is a key lever for sustainable and resilient economic and urban development. The Community of Practice Circular Cities NRW helps to make knowledge from existing initiatives and projects more visible, fosters collaboration, and accelerates the transfer of good practices between municipalities and other stakeholders. We are creating a platform with the potential to strengthen the strategic implementation of circular economy approaches in cities and scale them more broadly – a key objective of the Ministry,” says Cornelius Laaser, Head of Unit for Resource Efficiency and Circular Economy at MUNV.
An important topic for many participants is the challenge of reaching and engaging the right stakeholders. This is where municipalities see one of the greatest opportunities offered by the Community of Practice.
“Many municipalities are already working on circular solutions, often under very different conditions and with limited resources. The Community of Practice provides an opportunity to exchange experiences, learn from one another, and avoid reinventing the wheel. What is particularly valuable for us is the direct dialogue with other cities as well as with researchers, businesses, and public authorities. This enables us to jointly develop solutions that truly work in municipal practice.”, says Dilek Uzunyurt from the Office of Economic Development, Stolberg.
Broader considerations for circular economy in cities
Several participants argued for reframing circular economy discussions around themes such as resilience, economic competitiveness, crisis preparedness, and social inclusion. Such framing could help strengthen political support and facilitate collaboration across departments and stakeholder groups.
The question of how municipalities can learn more systematically from one another also featured prominently. Participants discussed the value of practical “blueprints”, transferable tools, and peer-learning formats that would allow cities to adapt proven approaches rather than starting from scratch.
“The transition towards circular cities requires not only innovative concepts, but also spaces where research and practice can come together. The Community of Practice creates exactly this connection. It enables scientific insights to be linked with the experiences of municipal actors, allows challenges to be reflected upon collectively, and supports the further development of new approaches based on real-world needs. In this way, it creates a valuable learning environment for everyone involved,” says Dr. Imke Schmidt, Co-Director of the Circular Society Research Division, at the Wuppertal Institute.
Check out the just launched Digital Collaboration Platform
To support this continuous exchange beyond in-person meetings, the Community of Practice has now launched its own digital collaboration platform. The platform combines short-form messaging, a shared calendar, collaborative documentation, and knowledge management functions, providing members with a space to stay connected, exchange resources, and continue discussions between events.
“At CSCP, this is where we see the greatest potential of the initiative. Circular cities will not emerge from a single strategy, technology, or flagship project, but from collective efforts of many actors learning together, experimenting together, and building on each other’s experiences.”, says Shirin.
To engage with us and learn more about the Digital Collaboration Platform, please contact Dr. Shirin Betzler.
Cities and regions are at the heart of the circular economy transition. Drawing on decades of experience in Europe and the Global South, Cristina Fedato Head of Sustainable Infrastructure, Products, and Services at the CSCP discusses what is needed to speed up change, how much progress has been made, and where the biggest opportunities remain.
Many circular economy approaches still overlook how deeply the linear model is rooted in regulatory frameworks, governance structures, and human behaviour. Why is that?
I believe that a linear approach is more deeply embedded in economic and social models. Regulatory frameworks and governance structures simply follow and reflect our way of life and the way we conduct economic and social thinking. Our relationship with natural resources has been linear from the very beginning; the extraction of natural resources was seen as technological progress. For example: in the last century, in my home country, Brazil, advancing into the Amazon rainforest was once considered a pioneering achievement. A felled tree was a symbol of progress.
The Industrial Revolution transformed production and accelerated economic growth, but it also established a linear pattern of resource use that contributed to environmental challenges. Sustainability emerged to address these impacts, while the circular economy represents a modern approach that seeks to maintain economic growth by minimising waste, extending resource life cycles, and regenerating natural systems.
The Circular Economy can be seen as an effort to create a more sustainable model of development by transforming production and extending circular principles to procurement, consumption, resource management, and everyday behaviours, drawing lessons from both the achievements as well as the limitations and the environmental and social costs of the Industrial Revolution. Cities and regions are the privileged loci to foster this new revolution!
How so?
I see cities in a privileged position both as public authorities that can create the right policies, conditions, and infrastructure for circularity (on an economic and societal level) as well as active actors that have the responsibility to make their operations as service providers more circular and sustainable.
But this is a big role that many cities seem not fully equipped to take on…
That is true, however a lot has been happening in Europe, in particular over the last few years, to help cities and regions unlock this potential. The EU has moved circular economy higher up the political agenda through the Circular Economy Action Plan, which has shifted the focus from waste management to designing products, services, and systems that follow the waste hierarchy and use resources more efficiently throughout their entire lifecycle.
At the same time, cities and regions are receiving more targeted support. Through initiatives such as the Circular Cities and Regions Initiative (CCRI), local authorities can access technical expertise, funding opportunities, peer learning, and practical guidance to turn circular economy ambitions into concrete projects. The idea is to help cities move from isolated pilot projects to systemic change. We as CSCP actively participate in projects supported by this initiative.
Europe is also creating a more enabling policy environment. New rules promoting product durability, repairability, and reuse, including the Right to Repair and Ecodesign, make it easier for cities, businesses, and citizens to adopt circular practices in everyday life.
Of course, there is still a long way to go. But compared to a decade ago, cities are no longer expected to figure it all out on their own.
Can you explain how you and other CSCP experts work on circularity with cities and regions?
Our work with cities and regions combines expertise from across teams to make circular economy ideas practical and scalable in real urban contexts. For example, in a typical CSCP project, an expert on social norms may work closely with an expert on circular business model innovation when addressing topics that require both behavioural change and systemic business transformation.
We combine strategic policy support, stakeholder engagement, and hands-on implementation through initiatives such as circular procurement, urban food systems, circular behaviours, biowaste management, and circular business models.
This integrated approach reflects our broader role as a bridge between research, policy, and practice.
We work at the same time in projects at the EU level as well as the local and national level in North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) and Germany, leveraging learnings and experiences from one level to the other.
How does such work play out on the ground?
It depends on the level we are looking at.
On an EU level, our work is closely linked to major efforts such as the Circular Cities and Regions Initiative and the European Circular Economy Stakeholder Platform.
Across Europe, we have been working closely with cities and supporting them in moving from ambition to implementation through big projects like the Route to Circular Economy (R2Pi), Circular Cities Declaration, City Loops, HOOP, SCALIBUR, or CARE.
In Germany we work with many cities, including Aachen, Wuppertal, or Duisburg to explore, design, and test concrete solutions on the ground and together with businesses, citizens, and communities.
But this work is never done in isolation with individual cities alone, and we increasingly see the need to take a regional perspective. We experience this first-hand through our role as hosts of the North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) Circular City Round Table and, more recently, as leaders of the Community of Practice for Circular Cities in NRW.
From what you describe, there seems to be strong momentum in cities. How can we better connect and amplify these efforts?
The Circular Economy asks for a new collaborative mindset beyond a linear and fragmented model of thinking: no one can become circular alone.
Not just public authorities and policymakers; businesses, too, come from a fragmented linear view, so all instances (need to) learn through circularity to work beyond their immediate walls to get collective results. Businesses and citizens need public authorities to offer them the right infrastructure in order to act in a circular way.
A good source for further reading on circular economy at a city level?
There are many, but our pioneering publication, the Circular Economy Guidebook for Cities, still remains a relevant compilation of key insights on circular economy in cities.
And to wrap up, what is your “dream scenario” for circular cities?
That circularity becomes the default way cities think and operate and that they become enablers of circular businesses and societies.
Cristina Fedato leads the Sustainable Infrastructure, Products, and Services team at the CSCP. You can read more about her work here and approach her directly to engage with us on circularity on a city and regional level.
Imagine a medium-sized enterprise (SME) in Germany’s Bergisch city triangle facing multiple simultaneous challenges: soaring raw material prices, fractured supply chains, and increasing client demands for data on product circularity.
This is exactly where the project bergisch.kompetenz steps in. Supporting real actors on the ground to address a vital question: How can the Circular Economy become a competitive advantage and resilience strategy for regional SMEs?
To bring this transformation to life, the project is hosting a landmark event in autumn 2026.
Save the Date: The bergisch.kompetenz Conference 2026
Mark your calendars for a day of inspiration, networking, and actionable business strategies:
Date & Time: September 24, 2026 | 08:00 – 17:00 Location: University of Wuppertal, Germany (Lecture Hall 32 & Foyer) Cost: Free of charge Language: German
Under the motto “Region in Transition – Shaping a Circular Economy Together”, the conference brings together around 100 participants from industry, craft, science, and politics. Instead of academic keynotes, the focus will be on economic viability and practical solutions.
You can look forward to interactive workshops, a dynamic Gallery Walk featuring real corporate use cases, funding overviews, and hands-on toolkits. A special highlight of the day will be the public signing of the Bergisch Circular Economy Declaration—a powerful collaborative signal for a resilient economic region.
Moving from theory to practice with CSCP
As a project partner, the CSCP is focused on supporting companies to bridge the gap between sustainability and profitability through targeted, hands-on support:
“The application areas for Bauer & Böcker’s products developed together with the CSCP have opened up new perspectives for product and business model innovation. The results clearly demonstrate the potential of systematically identifying and developing new fields of application.”, says Katja Gehrt from Bauer & Böcker, a manufacturing company based in Remscheid, Germany.
Your opportunity: Join the movement for free!
Numerous pioneering companies in the region are already on board, transforming their operations and reaping the benefits of resource independence.
Your business can be next—and there is no need to wait until the conference. While the project is running, interested SMEs can access all bergisch.kompetenz offers free of charge!
Start your journey today with our quick-response Quick-Check: we will assess your company’s circular optimisation potential and, if suitable, launch a tailored Use Case to future-proof your operations.
Reach out to Michael Mühlenbein to get started now!
To be part of the conference, register here!
What if the most circular choice in a supermarket was also the easiest, most attractive, and most rewarding one? Across Europe, many citizens care about sustainability, food waste, and climate impact. Yet in everyday life, good intentions often meet busy routines, confusing information, limited options, or retail environments that still make linear consumption the default.
“We see a clear opportunity here and that’s the starting point for our FOODWISE project, which we launched in June 2026. We want to work together with partners and relevant actors to redesign food systems so that circular choices become intuitive, accessible, and desirable.”, shares Nora Brüggemann, CSCP Senior Project Manager and Food Waste Expert.
Addressing the (big) gap FOODWISE brings together 13 partners from six European countries and is focused at accelerating the transition towards more circular food systems by addressing one of the most persistent challenges in sustainable consumption: the gap between awareness and action.
Food as a circular economy topic Food is sometimes less visible in circular economy debates than materials, packaging, textiles, or electronics. Yet food waste prevention is one of the most practical and impactful circular economy opportunities. Preventing edible food from becoming waste, improving redistribution and valorisation pathways, and helping consumers make better everyday choices all contribute to a system in which resources are used more responsibly and value is retained for longer.
The FOODWISE approach FOODWISE will focus on this opportunity by combining behavioural science, social innovation, business transformation, policy work, storytelling, and digital tools. The project will work with citizens, retailers, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), municipalities, and policymakers to better understand consumption patterns and circularity gaps — and to turn these insights into practical interventions that can be tested, evaluated, and scaled.
The CSCP role Building on a knowledge base in food waste prevention and sustainable consumption, the CSCP will lead the work on retail diagnostics, behaviour mapping, and co-designed interventions in retail and service environments. This includes analysing operational practices, consumer behaviour, existing circularity initiatives, and systemic barriers together with retail partners. The aim is to identify where targeted interventions can make circular food choices easier, more attractive, and more impactful.
Testing promising approaches A key element will be the development and testing of approaches such as the Conscious Aisle, which reimagines supermarkets as places where circular choices become more visible and intuitive.
Depending on the retail context, this may include interventions such as shelf labelling, product placement, loyalty incentives, digital prompts, pricing mechanisms, or storytelling campaigns.
These approaches will be designed with partners and evaluated from the outset, linking behavioural insights with operational indicators such as uptake rates, waste reduction, and scalability.
“At the CSCP, we are excited about the start of FOODWISE because it gives us the chance to build on existing circular economy and food waste knowledge and avoid reinventing the wheel. This is already our 12th project on food waste prevention, giving us a strong basis to help replicate and scale successful practices — always with impact creation in mind and together with great partners across Europe.”, says Nora.
Reach out to Nora Brüggemann to engage with us on circular food!
Alexander Mannweiler, Head of Sustainable Business and Entrepreneurship at the CSCP, has been engaging with the topic of resilience with cities, businesses, and communities. In this piece he explains why we need to move from exposure to agency and how that can be done.
“Thinking about weak or blind spots is not the most positive exercise. At least not at first glance. However, when resilience is not only seen as crisis response, mapping vulnerabilities is an added value. It is a way for organisations to understand their dependencies, reveal their weaknesses, strengthen relationships, and innovate.”
Preparedness means asking the right questions at the right time
In a world shaped by overlapping crises, resilience is no longer a nice-to-have. It is becoming a practical necessity. Risks that once felt distant or exceptional are now shaping everyday decisions: territorial conflicts, climate change, biodiversity loss, trade disruptions, and rising tariffs are influencing supply chains, investment decisions, public services and the daily operations of cities, civil society organisations, and businesses.
Policy is moving in the same direction: the EU Preparedness Strategy uses a whole-of-society preparedness logic; the European Climate Risk Assessment shows that climate risks are already systemic and cross-sectoral.
Those who understand their vulnerabilities today are better off tomorrow
From my perspective at the CSCP, and also from a business background, one insight stands out clearly: organisations that take time to understand their vulnerabilities today will be better prepared to act tomorrow.
This is not about predicting every possible disruption. It is about asking the right questions early enough.
Which materials, suppliers or partners are critical? Where are we dependent on long, fragile or opaque supply chains? Which processes would fail first if a key input suddenly became unavailable? Where do we already have options to adapt, substitute or collaborate differently?
Companies can use these questions to identify dependencies on key materials, suppliers, IT providers, logistics routes or energy inputs.
Cities can use them to test which essential systems would come under pressure first during heatwaves, floods or energy and fuel shortages: elderly care, public transport, water supply, hospitals or emergency services.
Civil society can use them to ask who is being reached, who is being left out, who is trusted locally, and how preparedness can strengthen social cohesion instead of deepening existing inequalities. The EU’s 2025 Strategic Foresight Report frames resilience as a forward-looking capacity, and Germany’s Deutschland-Monitor 2025 speaks directly to how people relate to change and reform.
Resilience starts with knowing what we depend on
Talking about resilience has also the huge benefit of creating self-awareness. When organisations map their dependencies, they gain a clearer picture of their stakeholders, their strengths, and their blind spots. They understand better which customers, clients, suppliers, local actors and public partners they need to involve in preparation efforts. That knowledge can lead to stronger relationships, greater trust and more confidence in one’s own ability to respond.
There is also an innovation dimension. Once critical dependencies become visible, new solutions often emerge. Some materials may be replaceable. Some suppliers may be diversified. Some processes may be redesigned to rely on more local, easier-to-manage, or more circular supply chains. In that sense, resilience thinking triggers innovation.
We need to move from exposure to agency
Perhaps the most important shift is psychological: resilience helps organisations move from a feeling of vulnerability to a feeling of preparedness. It strengthens the understanding that cities, companies and civil society are not merely passive victims of change. They can shape responses, make choices and build capacity together.
The question is not whether pressure on cities, businesses, and communities will continue. It will. The real question is whether we are willing to build capacities to respond before pressure turns into crisis?
So, whether you are a city, a business, or a civil society representative, there’s a place at the table for you, because resilience is built together!
We will deep-dive into the topic of resilience at the upcoming Circular Week 2026—be there to join the conversation!
For all other questions, reach out to Alexander Mannweiler directly!
From high land prices in the Netherlands to complex EU seed regulations in Spain, community-led business models in agriculture and related bio-based production systems across Europe are facing growing external pressures. Despite the challenges, with the right support, local communities can play a central role in building more resilient, sustainable, and locally rooted food systems.
The NEXRUR project brings together partners from across Europe to better understand, support, and strengthen community-led agricultural business models. Through collaboration, research, and exchange between local actors, the project works to identify and address barriers as well as unlock opportunities that allow such businesses to thrive.
Mapping real-world challenges
In April 2026, project partners from 8 European countries and China, who conducted 21 diverse and complementary NEXRUR community-led agriculture businesses, gathered in Burgos, Spain to map the real-world challenges, from unfair pricing and complex agricultural and land use regulations to climate pressures and digital tools.
Facilitated by Hafiz Ahmad, Project Manager at the CSCP, the session used a PESTEL framework to help participants reflect on the political, economic, social, technological, environmental, and legal landscape to find the motivation, barriers and opportunities for community-led agricultural business models.
“Fair pricing stood out as a persistent challenge: farmers and rural actors involved in community-led business models in agriculture struggle to earn fair incomes while consumers remain sensitive to price. Access to finance is also difficult, with banks being oriented toward capital-intensive models that do not fit rural agricultural enterprises. EU and local subsidies are available but hard to access for smaller or seasonal operations, while overly complex regulations, including EU seed laws and nitrogen rules, create disproportionate burdens for small-scale and organic producers.”, says one participant.
Between barriers and opportunities
From the power of community to the dual edge of technology, the workshop helped identify these key aspects:
Strong relationships in the community stood out as a key assets. Initiatives like Oosterwold demonstrated what participatory models can achieve when local people are genuinely committed to shaping and maintaining their own community-led agricultural and rural development processes. Yet demographic decline and the difficulty of making rural agricultural professions attractive to younger generations remain real concerns, alongside high labour demands and the slow pace of building consumer awareness.
Technology presented a dual edge: precision farming tools and digital sales platforms offer efficiency gains, but adoption costs are high and complexity can become a barrier in itself.
“An overly complicated webshop actually hindered rather than helped the producers we work with.“, noted one of the participants.
Climate change loomed large, from extreme frost events and water scarcity to soil health challenges and nitrogen pollution conflicts.
One participant noted that “…many community businesses are already contributing to climate resilience, local employment, and sustainable food production, but current economic systems often fail to recognise or adequately reward these contributions.”
The way forward
Despite these challenges, the workshop revealed multiple opportunities, such as growing consumer interest in local and quality produce, new EU funding streams, and the emergence of cooperative structures that help individual producers share costs and risks.
These insights will feed directly into NEXRUR’s baseline analysis and inform stakeholder engagement and future policy discussions, helping to shape more supportive conditions for community-led rural businesses across Europe.
The project will run for four years, from 2026 to 2029. It is funded by the European Commission under the Horizon Europe programme.
For further questions, please contact Ahmad ur Hafiz.
What does a circular city look like in practice? In Aachen, Germany, citizens, community initiatives, but also businesses and public administration actors came together to explore this question.
Through a series of community workshops, participants developed concrete ideas for making circular economy visible, practical, and locally relevant.
Rather than starting with predefined solutions, the three workshops held as part of the Circular City Aachen project created space for dialogue, collaboration and the development of locally grounded ideas.
Repair & Reuse
The first workshop focused on repair and reuse. Participants discussed how existing reuse initiatives could become more visible and accessible, and explored ideas such as a shared marketplace for refurbished electrical devices, stronger cooperation between reuse actors, a textile hub for upcycling and clothing exchange, solar panel upcycling concepts, and new approaches to extending the lifetime of products and materials.
Circular Food Systems
The second workshop addressed circular food systems. Discussions highlighted opportunities to strengthen local food networks through a FoodHub concept, explore regional composting solutions and support businesses, caterers and organisations in dealing with surplus food and regulatory challenges. Participants emphasised that many resources, initiatives and expertise already exist in Aachen but are often not well connected.
Fostering Dialogue
The third workshop brought these community perspectives into dialogue with representatives of the City of Aachen administration. The discussion focused on governance questions and the role public administration can play in enabling circularity. Topics included visibility of existing initiatives, public procurement, coordination, communication and the conditions needed to turn promising ideas into viable pilot projects.
“Across all three workshops, one message became clear: a circular city is not only about technologies or infrastructure. It also requires collaboration, shared learning and spaces where different actors can jointly shape solutions.”, notes Alexandra Kessler, who manages the project.
The workshops are part of a broader effort within the Circular City Aachen project, which aims to develop a Circular City Roadmap, strengthen local networks and support the emergence of concrete pilot projects that contribute to a more circular and resilient city.
Would you like to engage with us? Reach out to Alexandra Kessler.
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