The team of Stara Zagora Regional Economic Development Agency (SZREDA) received recognition for its work. An international workshop that generated zero waste as an event was published as a good practice in the INTERREG Europe Platform platform that aims to exchange useful experience across the EU.
In the third semester of the project GPP4Growth, co-funded under INTERREG Europe as part of the project activities, SZREDA hosted an international thematic workshop on the implementation of environmental criteria in Green Public Procurement in Stara Zagora. The event lasted 2 days (May 16-17, 2018) and all GPP4Growth partners participated with members of their stakeholder groups and external experts. On May 16, in addition to the partners and their stakeholders, SZREDA invited local stakeholders from the Ministry of Tourism, the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Transport, the Executive Environment Agency, the National Forest Agency and the managing authority of one of the operational programs in Bulgaria, which is part of the Ministry of Economy.
This created an opportunity to exchange experience at a very high level, involving national decision-makers, external experts and stakeholders from partner countries. To give a good example, SZREDA, as a project partner, chose external expertise to organize the event, and the treaty stated that steps should be taken to ensure that the international meeting is a zero-waste event. This included edible coffee cups without plastic and paper cups, and the use of paper was reduced to the lowest possible level to generate zero waste. The event is an example of upcoming conferences, which can draw on experience from ARRD-Stara Zagora in the desire to organize events that do not have a negative impact on the environment.
SZREDA is a partner of the project "GPP4Growth - Green Public Procurement for Regional Growth through Resource Efficiency", funded under the INTERREG EUROPE Program. The lead partner is the University of Patras, Greece and nine partners from nine EU member states (Greece, Italy, Poland, Belgium, Spain, Latvia, Bulgaria, Ireland and Malta).
The main goal of the GPP4Growth project is to improve the capacity of local authorities and institutions to implement resource-efficient policies and promote eco-innovation and green growth through the effective implementation of Green Public Procurement. 7% the number of companies in the partner consortium regions that take environmental factors into account, and are spending on this in the production of goods, deliveries and services.
