Today, the Galician Regional Government informed the public about a new call for proposals directed at small and medium enterprises (SME’s) who want to turn their production processes into a sustainable closed loop, also known as circularity. This will be made possible as part of a European Commission transborder initiative called C-Voucher which wants to set a stepping stone towards the gradual introduction of a circular economy on the continent.
A circular economy seeks to imitate the biological processes in nature where nothing is wasted
The project in the northwestern Spanish autonomous community will be managed by the Galician Innovation Agency (Gain), which is the official partner and expert arm of the regional administration. The call for proposals is opened until 30 October 2020 for SME’s working in the fields of health, blue economy, textiles, agriculture and manufacturing.
Candidates will have to present innovative solutions which significantly improve on aspects, such as energy efficiency, material resource efficiency, renewable energy usage, bio-degradable products, the extension of product life cycles and shared economy.
The 24 winners will be able to receive a grant of up to 15 000 euros if their ideas are well received and found to be beneficial towards the aims of the project. Furthermore, for a period of three months, they will also be able to receive a technical assessment on the viability of the proposed business model, as well as financial consulting.
C-Voucher, which was launched in 2018, is the first European Commission project that seeks to introduce a circular type of economy in several countries of the EU. The idea is to transform the SME’s value chains from cradle-to-waste to a cradle-to-cradle model which is based on natural cycle processes.
Similar calls for proposals will also take place in 5 other EU countries: Poland, France, Denmark, Sweden and Romania.
Source: TheMayor.EU
