The Urban Partnership on Circular Economy met in Mechelen (Belgium) on May 24-25 to finalise the preparation of the Draft Action Plan as well as to analyse the evolution of the first batch of actions, launched earlier this year.

The two-day meeting kicked-off with a study visit at the De Potterij, a project of the Public Waste Agency of Flanders (OVAM) to make circular reuse of an abandoned spaced in central Mechelen (for further information on this practice, please refer to Action 10).

Then, after the welcome and introduction of the day by Coordinator Håkon Jentoft and a general session on the state-of-play, the Partnership members moved on to the core of the discussions.

Leaders from Actions 1-8 presented the progress of their respective actions, focusing on the analysis of the feedback from the public consultations, the status of the actions and their plans for implementation. On the second day of the meeting, leaders from Actions 9-12 explained their advancement on the actions development with regards to the second phase of the public consultation, which will open in July this year until the 4 September 2018.

The Partnership members then continued their work debating the prioritisation of actions, their suitability and their scope. The meeting finalised with the conclusions and the next steps, including the announcement of the next meeting in Athens on the 26-28 of September.