A Balkan project connects businesses and municipalities to reduce waste
An information platform will connect industry sectors and stakeholders to engage in a solid industrial waste reuse chain. It includes business and municipalities on the territory of the Balkans. The condition is that they register on the platform and publish up-to-date information about their industrial waste.
The Bulgarian Chamber of Commerce is a partner in the "Balkan Platform for Waste Reuse" project, financed by the European INTERREG program. Organizations from Albania, Greece and Cyprus also participate in it.
The purpose of the SWAN online platform is to connect industrial sectors or large producers of solid industrial waste, such as municipalities, for example, in order to reduce waste. Most often this happens by selling them as raw material to other industrial sectors or enterprises. The platform works at the level of region, country and the Balkan region. It compiles a database with detailed technical characteristics of industrial solid waste producers and potential users, as well as an inventory of best commercial practices for their reuse. Each of the four countries in the consortium is represented on the platform - http://www.swanplatform.eu/
More recycling, less landfilling - that's the way to go. Poor waste management contributes to climate change and air pollution and directly affects many ecosystems and species. Considered the bottom of the waste hierarchy, landfills release methane, a very powerful greenhouse gas linked to climate change. Ultimately, whether waste is a problem or a resource depends entirely on how we manage it. The innovative information platform aims to significantly reduce the import of raw materials, reduce industrial waste and landfills, reduce CO2 emissions. In parallel, the creation of jobs and new business opportunities is supported. The ultimate goal is to connect the industrial sectors of the Balkans that produce and use solid waste. This will create new opportunities for recycling that have not been used locally and can be profitable in a cross-border aspect.