As the Cities Forum ended on the 28th of November, the city of Rotterdam provided us with meeting facilities at SS Rotterdam to hold the 6th Meeting of the Partnership on Circular Economy. SS Rotterdam was a great venue for a meeting, an old steamboat that was refurnished into a conference venue and hotel. The ship represents circular thinking at its finest.

At the Sundeck all partners met to discuss the progress of the topic on Urban Resources, namely Urban Resource Management, Bio-Resources and Collaborative Economy. Circulating in groups all partners were presented with the main barriers uncovered and the proposed actions from these topics. It was an intense and exciting process. All the topic leaders had prepared their actions and presented them to the rest of the partnership. Based on the feedback during the group session they decided on which actions to put forward as proposed actions that the partnership should vote on.

Through a sticker session, partners voted on which of the actions they thought was important for the Partnership to continue working with. These are the so-called Rotterdam actions and will be added to the list of actions that the Partnership already voted on during the meeting in Prato.

The topic of Circular Buildings was also addressed, and it was decided that Prato will be taking lead in developing the scope and bringing forward potential actions also on this topic.

After this session, Action leaders of the actions agreed upon in Prato presented the progress of their work. The partnership is still very dedicated and a lot of efforts has been put down in the preparations and work between the Partnerships meetings. Going from a scoping phase to work on the proposed action is a challenging but also an inspiring process.

The draft Action Plan is to be ready by the 31st of January, and the partnership has a lot of work to do prior to our next meeting in Brussels on the 17th and 18th of January.