"<< Background >>In 2019, young people and students from Europe and all over the world took to the streets to demand action to halt environmental and climate change. On a day of action in Mach organizers said there were more than 2,000 protests in 125 countries. The student movement was inspired by 16-year-old Greta Thunberg, now nominated for a Nobel Prize, who kicked off a global movement after she sat outside Swedish parliament every Friday beginning last August. Young people have elevated the need for the environment to be included in the school curriculum.The development of the circular economy is seen as central to reducing damage to the environment and developing positive change. In 2015 the European Commission adopted an action plan to help accelerate Europe's transition towards a circular economy, boost global competitiveness, promote sustainable economic growth and generate new jobs.The agreements at COP26 and the high level of public engagement around the event and subsequent actions show that there is still an ongoing need for skills and competencies around Circular Economy if we are to have any chance of slowing the effects of climate change.<< Objectives >>1.To develop guidelines for the establishment of permanent forums for dialogue between youth organisations and local authorities to promote circular economy practices.2. To develop and implement training programmes and activities for young people in the field of the circular economy3. To promote a dialogue through bringing together organisations in the field of the Circular economy and youth organisations on a European, national and regional basis and to promote an exchange of information and best practice. To develop initiatives and projects (including the promotion of entrepreneurial enterprises) for young people in the field of the circular economy and to produce an interactive map of projects and activities in this field.4. To develop and exchange Open Educational Resources (OERs) for young people to support the profile of a ""circular economy facilitator”5. To develop a web application to guide young people in setting up initiatives around the Circular Economy.<< Implementation >>The creation and implementation of Youth Forums in partner countries leading to the creation of local action plans.Research and production of guidelines to support the creation of new youth forums in non-partner areas.Training materials, templates and guide for young people to evaluate their own positioning in regards to circular economy and then design and run their own training sessions, workshops or circular economy initiatives.Open Educational Resources to facilitate ideation, setting up and running a circular business or initiative.Network mapping activity to identify best practices in circular economy across EuropeCollation of resources and best practice exemplars along with a self assessment tool web-app.<< Results >>- Downloadable literature Review and youth forum guidelines including model engagement methods and stakeholder analysis http://ceyou.eu/youth-forum-guidelines/- 5 Key recommendations for facilitating Circular Economy Youth forums.- Establishment of 5 ongoing youth forums and the workshops, events, action plans and actions elaborated by those groups. http://ceyou.eu/circular-youth/- Toolkit downloadable from http://ceyou.eu/toolkit/ and comprising • Basic theoretical knowledge on the concept of Circular Economy.• Recommendations on accessible eco-friendly habits to start your own circular journey and lead by example.• Resources and contacts to share with participants when organising and event on Circular Economy• Advice on non-formal education and how to facilitate an inclusive event• Templates for training programmes• Ideas of non-formal activities on CE- Over 40 Open Educational Resources to support young people through their circular economy journey http://ceyou.eu/circular-resources/- Supporting the initiation and continuation of localised CE initiatives resulting from the action plans.- Interactive web app with self assessment tool, CE readiness dashboard and resources- Map of best practices and CEYOU Network"

<< Background >>The role of rurality in the prosperity of the European Union (EU) is widely acknowledged. Meanwhile, rural areas tend to lose their positions and opportunities in an increasingly urbanizing world. Despite the diversity of rural areas in terms of their socio-economic performances, natural characteristics, and cultural heritage, the majority of them demonstrates intrinsic fragility in social, economic and environmental aspects, and, consequently, different rural areas face common challenges, experience depreciation of their values and underutilization of the opportunities they are able to provide.In the 2016 High Level OECD Seminar “Delivering productivity and competitiveness for rural areas” four “areas of opportunity” emerged: forestry, local foods, tourism, and renewable energy. Forestry is considered to be an integral part of rural development. Beyond providing wood products, healthy, sustainably managed forests are valuable tools for mitigating and combating climate change. They are also locations for important recreational activities, such as appreciation of nature, hiking and mountain biking, and, together with other rural sectors, can produce a variety of local foods. In many EU countries, the local food system is used as part of a regional tourism strategy where specific foods are the focus for visitors who follow a “trail” that leads them from producer to producer. These local foods provide an opportunity to market a region’s food products to a global audience, as well as connecting local farmers to the communities in which they reside. To some, renewable energy is rural energy, because virtually all renewable energy technologies are space-intensive and thus rely upon a rural location. Wind, biodiesel, and photovoltaic technologies now represent the fastest growing energy industries, whereby windfarms require clear sites, biofuels rely on agricultural feed stocks, and solar generation, though somewhat more flexible, is increasingly implemented on open rural land.On the other hand, over the last few years experts on rural development policy have consistently identified out-migration and ageing as key trends affecting investment decisions in rural areas, along with “changes in the rural economic structure” and the “decentralization” process. Thus, rural areas share also common structural vulnerabilities: distance, lack of critical mass and low population density. Furthermore, the recession, the COVID pandemic in combination with the consequences from the ongoing climate changed have put an extra burden to rural entrepreneurs, who are facing increasing complexity and deep uncertainty in their business, exacerbating existing vulnerabilities.Maximizing the opportunities depends on a constellation of factors coming together. If one or two of the elements cannot be achieved, there could be continued stagnation or decline instead of transformation. In other words, no matter how much progress is made towards tapping rural opportunities, if rural vulnerabilities are not addressed, they could render any form of progress shallow. These discussions underscore the importance of exploiting future opportunities in a manner that addresses rural vulnerabilities and current state of the art calls for new strategies and models of rural development to be found and applied so to turn lagging rural areas into resilient rural communities.<< Objectives >>The main objective of the OREN project is to involve agricultural entrepreneurs in an interactive learning programme, specifically designed and addressed to the rural development issues in the COVID era. The partnership will develop an interactive, multi-stakeholder platform that will contain sustainable rural business models, simulation models and mathematical tools, accompanied by managerial courses targeted to agricultural entrepreneurs. The purpose is to train the participants in advanced managerial and business skills. By acquiring such skills, the entrepreneurs will be able to analyse the root causes of successful business scenarios in order to improve their expertise and skills in understanding and modelling potential good practices. More particularly, the OREN objectives are:- Discover insights and emerging patterns regarding rural business development.- Discover and analyze factors (environmental, socio-economic, geographical etc.) that contribute to successful rural businesses.- Analyze the structural elements of rural development, map the relationships that might lead to successful business models, and explore them through simulation with the purpose of identifying potential policies and points of unintended consequences- Develop and promote work-based learning for agricultural entrepreneurs with the purpose of increasing their business skillsIn order to achieve such objectives, the training will provide the involved actors with the skills to design effective business models in diverse settings and the tools (theoretical and technical) to implement them appropriately. Hence, the OREN project aims to:(1) Provide of a better understanding of the modern rural economies, generate knowledge of successful rural business models and identify the factors that can lead to sustainable growth.(2) Provide tools (theoretical and technical) for entrepreneurship in rural areas, a database of business cases and an interactive learning framework.(3) Through the acquiring of advanced business skills, the OREN project aims at stimulating local economic development especially in poor and remote areas.(4) Increase the added value of those businesses and lead to job creation in rural areas (5) Make rural businesses more sustainable and resilient to changes that hinder their development<< Implementation >>The OREN project will address such issue by implementing the following approach:(1) establish a multi-stakeholder interaction, as a valuable strategy to enhance the modern rural economy opportunities,(2) build and transfer a “dynamic capability”, which can help rural actors to engage in multistakeholder interaction for sustainability and maintain their profits at the same time.(3) Increase the business skills of rural entrepreneurs by promoting continued education and training in advanced aspects of business management despite the restriction posed by the COVID pandemic.<< Results >>Measurable results will be:- (R1) a survey of the most promising community-based rural business models, analyzing their critical success factors, delivered at month 7;- (R2) a report on the fundamental dynamics explaining the community-based approach delivered at month 15, elaborated through a collaborative model building approach, addressing: environments and social dynamics, pattern emergence, triggers and catalyzers, risks mapping;- (R3) a suite of simulation models and an interactive learning environment, developed and released at month 19;- (O4) a set of 5 complementary courses, with related course materials, to be provided together and with the support of the decision support system; these will be ready at month 16 and will address the following topics: (1) Legislative skills (EU agenda on rural development); (2) Technical skills; (3) Methodological skills (mathematical modeling; rural business innovation); (4) Sociological skills; (5) Entrepreneurial skills. Courses will be produced in English and all the elaborated material will be translated the partners’ languages too. These courses will be held fully online. It is the purpose of the partnership to engage at least 10 participants from each country.- (R4) guidelines with respect to rural development strategies, delivered at month 24;- (R5) recommendations based on lesson learnt during the project executions, delivered at month 24 and shared during the final conference (E4).These outputs will be disseminated both trough online channels and by means of two conferences (multiplier events). The first (E1), targeting civil society and agricultural organizations beyond the partnership, to share the former results of the project and gain further insights useful for tuning both the models and the courses’ materials; it will take place at month 19.Three final conference (E2-E4), will be held during the last months of the project with the purpose of disseminating the project results to relevant stakeholders and rural communities at the partner countries and the EU.

Green Public Procurement (GPP), the purchase of goods, services and works by governments and state-owned enterprises respecting sustainability criteria, will be increasingly used by all level of governments in order to achieve the European Green Deal challenge and international targets on circular economy. As highlighted OECD (2019) to address barriers and realise the benefits from GPP, the need to increase the engagement of a variety of stakeholders and “develop a procurement workforce with the capacity to continually deliver value for money efficiently and effectively” do not affect only public officers. Companies’ participation in the adoption of strategic policy objectives for sustainability is a key factor to set a realistic path to make “Europe the first climate-neutral continent by 2050”. GREENER aims to support companies' participation in GPP with systemic effectiveness on the conditions of sustainability and business competitiveness. To do this, the skills of middle management and the more traditional profiles of the administration need to be updated. A systemic action of renewal of the VET paths addressed to these profiles is the priority of GREENER project.The objectives of GREENER are:1. Improve the skills of procurers and administrative profiles focusing on SMEs, with regard to GPP criteria, including ecolabels, material passports, product eco-design and design for recyclability, extended producer responsibility, waste prevention, packaging material and sharing, collaborative economy, reuse, and refurbishment; 2. Enhancing the responsiveness of curricula of traditional profiles, such as administrative professionals working in SMEs tendering departments, to the future demand of skills (upskilling – reskilling training path)3. Increasing the employability of VET students facing the global challenges 4. Improve regional actors’ readiness and create knowledge awareness on the influence of green public procurement on the adoption of sustainable consumption and production patterns by businesses operating in the region;5. Foster the VET attractivity relaunching the close cooperation between VET, public administrations, government agencies and bodies established to support SME development and SMEs, the Transparency Tools for skills validation and trainers’ capacity to apply an international mindset for education.GREENER’s partners define a strategic partnership among Bulgaria, Belgium, Spain, Italy, including: VET Providers, who works in close cooperation with national employers' associations. They are CLEANTECH (BG), BCO (BG), SFC Sistemi Formativi Confindustria (IT), CETEM (ES).UNIVERSITIES specialised in Sustainable Management as is Scuola Superiore S. Anna (IT)DECENTRALIZED AUTHORITIES, through ACR+, international network of cities and regions sharing the aim of promoting a sustainable resource management and accelerating the transition towards a circular economy on their territories and beyond.GREENER will involve:- a direct target defined by a transnational group of procurers, responsible in implementing circular public procurement processes (5 per each country) and administrative profiles workers involved in tendering processes, as accountants - administrative staff – purchasers (10 per each country). They will be involved in the project activities and in the training piloting phase, aimed to foster the transferability of GREENER curricula in the I-VET and C-VET existing offer. - an indirect target, made of its wider stakeholder community, constantly involved in the assessment and validation of project activities and Intellectual Output. At least 10 persons from each country will participate in the community, being: Manager /Middle Management from both SMEs and large enterprises, VET Experts, Sustainable management researchers, policy-maker relevant for Education & Labour as well as for GPP. Impacts on VET Innovation and Companies’ engagement in GPP will be reached through the following results:- IO1 Design of a common skills framework for professionals in circular and strategic sustainable procurement. It will enhance the responsiveness of curricula of traditional profiles to the future demand of skills, as well as increase the employability of VET students facing global challenges- IO2 GREENER e-learning platform completed by the Report “European Training Curricula for GREENER Administrative and Middle management in companies” will contribute to improve the skills of procurers and SMEs administrative profiles with regard to GPP criteria- IO3 Training Course will develop, through an extensive pilot testing phase involving 40 learners, a modular training program adapted to local industry stakeholder needs- IO4 GREENER Toolbox for the development of I-VET and C-VET programs will focus on developing a toolbox to support the development of I-VET and C-VET programs to help companies successfully apply for tenders that incorporate GPP requirements.