Around 50 representatives from key stakeholders on local waste management in the Mediterranean took part in the final capitalisation event of the Med4Waste project that place from 24^th to 26^th of October in Cagliari, Italy.

The event was co-organised with the WES project, constituting one of their regional capacity-building activities on waste management. The “Water and Environment Support (WES) in the ENI Neighbourhood South Region” project is a regional technical support project funded by the European Neighbourhood Instrument (ENI South) that aims to protect the natural resources in the Mediterranean context and to improve the management of scarce water resources in the region. WES mainly aims to solve the problems linked to pollution prevention and the rational use of water and strives to create a supportive environment and increase the capacity of all stakeholders in the WES Partner Countries.

The 3-days event brought together policy-makers (ministry officials), local authorities, the private sector, NGOs, researchers, and other stakeholders, to strengthen capacities and skills for informed decision-making related to decentralized waste management in the region.

MedCities presented the results of the mentoring scheme for municipalities on integrated waste management, which provided guidance and technical support to six municipalities from Lebanon (2), Jordan (2), and Tunisia (2) to improve their waste management systems through 4 main activities:

1. Improve or develop their Integrated Municipal Waste Management (IMWM) plan
2. Implement a tailor-made supporting action aligned with their IMWM plan
3. Twinning and exchange program with a city from another ENI project that has implemented a solution to enhance its waste management system
4. Social entrepreneurship program for 2 local SMEs and Start-ups: Development of a social value-based waste solution that can respond to the regional challenges previously identified

Mahdia, one of the mentor municipalities and a member of MedCities, presented its experience. They have implemented the following actions thanks to the mentorship scheme:

• Update of its Integrated Municipal Waste Management and development of a local strategy on circular economy.
• Development of a feasibility study about the functioning of their new composting plant.
• Organization of an awareness campaign for organic waste recovery in their pilot district.
• Participation in the study visit to Vic (Spain) to learn about community composting plant management.
• Implement technological solutions to improve its waste management system, like installing GPS devices and providing a basic mobile/web tracking application for municipal trucks.

Mahdia representative also talked about the exchange visit that the Municipality did to Vic (Catalonia) with Beta Tech Center which helped them to go deeper in their knowledge.