The first meeting of the mentoring scheme, including all project partners involved and the local experts on waste management, took place online between the end of March and the beginning of April.

The meetings marked the beginning of a fruitful collaboration between the consortium of Med4Waste ENI CBC Med capitalization project and the 6 selected municipalities with the final aim of creating or improving more sustainable and efficient waste management plans for each city. It was just the first of a series of working meetings that will also include technical experts and field visits to the pilot experiences of some waste projects also funded by ENI CBC Med programme.

In fact, the following twinning partnerships have been defined between the municipalities and other ENI CBC projects and related outputs developed:

• Deir Qanon ElNaher (Lebanon) and Madaba (Jordan) with the REUSEMED project on the creation of municipal networks based on reuse circuits.
• Akkar Al-Atika (Lebanon) with the MED-InA project on zero waste management policies.
• Byrain (Jordan) and M’Saken (Tunisia) with the CLIMA project on the participatory process to develop municipal waste management plans.
• Mahdia (Tunisia) with the DECOST project on decentralised and community composting.

Study visits will be organised with the objective of transferring results, methodologies and lessons learnt by the territories that implemented promising solutions.

Med4Waste mentoring scheme, under the coordination of MedCities, will provide expert guidance and advice on the most suitable waste management solutions tailored to their specific needs. Moreover, BusinessMed will offer mentorship to two local SMEs or start-ups to develop ground-breaking solutions that will aid in achieving the town’s waste management objectives.