EU// The project "Management of solid waste with the involvement of the community from Străseni" was successfully completed!

It took place on September 27, in the premises of the Străseni Municipality Town Hall Finalization conference of the project "Management of solid waste through the active involvement of the community" Străseni district. The project was implemented by the AO Association for Waste Recovery within the EU Local Grants Program "Be the change: Citizens involved - Sustainable Communities!", launched through the project "Empowering citizens in the Republic of Moldova" (2019-2021), financed by to the European Union and implemented by the German International Cooperation Agency (GIZ).

The activities of this project were carried out between September 2020 and September 2021 in 6 localities of the Străseni district (Străseni municipality, Scoreni village, Lozova commune, Vorniceni village, Negrești village and Sireți village) with the aim of contributing to raising awareness and community participation to reduce the impact of waste on the environment and health. Accordingly, during the conference all the registration results were presented, but also the obstacles/difficulties encountered in organizing an efficient and correct waste management system were discussed.

Objective 1. Assessing citizens' perception of the role and benefits of selective waste collection.

The objective was achieved through the achievement The study "The perception and attitude of the inhabitants of the population regarding the selective collection of waste from the Străseni river".

The data collected and analyzed in this study provide a clear vision regarding the existing situation in the field of waste management and the involvement of the community in solving these problems. Accordingly, the main topics analyzed in the study are:

1. Evaluation of the population's degree of access to sanitation services;
2. Analysis of the level of satisfaction of the inhabitants in relation to the current system of selective waste collection applied in the locality;
3. Evaluation of separate waste collection behavior among residents;
4. Appreciation of the availability of the population to selectively collect waste;
5. Determining the level of tariffs that natural persons in the selected localities are prepared to pay for the improvement of waste management services;
6. The quality of the waste management services made available to the inhabitants of the district by the LPAs, etc.

Objective 2. Increasing the level of knowledge regarding priorities in the field of environmental protection and sustainable development among students

The objective was achieved by achieving a 6 informative-educational seminars for the training of trainers. A total of 100 trainers from 6 project beneficiary localities were informed and empowered to contribute directly to increasing the level of community involvement in good environmental practices focused primarily on the selective collection and composting of waste.

With involvement and support opinion leaders, the launch of the Separate Waste Collection Campaign was also successful, which took place between March and May 2021 and ended with the organization of a special event Awards gala for the most active participants in the campaign "Say NO to Plastic Pollution". The event brought together an impressive number of people of different ages, especially children, parents and teachers who were actively involved during the campaign and who were able to enjoy and share with the whole community the beautiful results achieved during the last 3 months, most of which are published on the project's group page Say NO to PLASTIC pollution. In total, more than 90 teachers and more than 1600 children and students from 12 preschool, high school and gymnasium educational institutions have adopted an eco-responsible behavior through the project and the campaign, getting involved in reducing plastic pollution and promoting the benefits of collecting separate of these wastes.

Objective 3. Stimulating the civic and participatory spirit of citizens in solving the problem of waste within the community

The objective was achieved by creating the minimum necessary infrastructure for separate plastic collection and composting education/practice. In this sense, the project succeeded in developing and supplying 44 nets for the separate collection of plastic and 90 boxes for composting. Empowering the community for the separate collection of recyclables was supported including through a 6 composting workshops and a series of workshops with the theme "The polluter pays: Practical and legal aspects". Useful information has been structured and published in a Good practice guide also accessible online.

Objective 4. Organizing and ensuring citizens' access to information and data about the benefits of organizing selective waste collection

The objective was achieved by creating the web page https://ecostraseni.md/, dedicated to the project and for the benefit of the community, which includes the types of waste generated in the locality, environmental impact and selective collection methods, the benefits of waste recycling, an interactive map of waste collection points, Guide to selective waste collection, etc.

The project started from the motivation that "The production of waste cannot be avoided, but the economic value of a product that has become waste can be recovered and with certainty the impact on the environment, health and climate change can be minimized". In this sense, together with the beneficiaries of the project, we reconfirmed that there is still much to do, and the project represented the launch of an open dialogue platform with the LPAs, with whom we will continue to collaborate to ensure the sustainability of the activities carried out.

AO "Association for Waste Recovery" is the beneficiary of the Local Grants Program of the European Union and implements the project "Management of solid waste with the involvement of the community" in 6 localities in Străseni r.

The local grants program is launched on the basis of the EU Single Support Framework, granted for the Republic of Moldova (2017-2020) within the European Neighborhood Instrument, through the project "Empowering the citizens of the Republic of Moldova" (2019-2021), financed by European Union and implemented by the German International Cooperation Agency (GIZ).

The project partner for the Central Development Region is Association for Efficient and Responsible Governance AGER in partnership with the Public Association Agency for Regional Development "Habitat" (AO ADR "Habitat").