RECEBA kicks off in Rome

RECEBA is officially under way. On 12 and 13 of May, the consortium met in Rome for the project’s kick-off, hosted by coordinator Sistemi Formativi Confindustria.

The circular transition is not only about new business models and technologies. It needs people with the skills to make it work, and those skills do not yet exist at the scale the transition requires. This is the gap RECEBA is built to close.

Co-funded by Erasmus+ as a Centre of Vocational Excellence, RECEBA brings together 17 partners across six European regions: Lazio, Navarre, Wallonia, Friesland, Normandy, and Bulgaria. Over the next four years it will set up a Circular Business Lab in each region and build training pathways that connect VET providers, companies, public authorities, and research around a shared circular skills agenda.

The approach is what gives the project a chance to shift something real. Rather than designing training in the abstract, RECEBA builds it inside the regional ecosystems where it has to work, with SMEs, training providers, public authorities, and researchers around the same table. Several of the regions already run regional innovation ecosystems in the circular economy; RECEBA gives them a dedicated space to work on skills alongside the innovation already in motion.

The intended impact is concrete: training programmes that regional authorities and funding instruments can adopt. Workers and citizens who want to take part in the circular transition finding a clear path to do it. Companies entering circular markets finding the skilled people they need. Public administrations investing in their own staff, because the transition will not happen without competent people driving it from inside.

The Rome meeting was a real start, also thanks to Lazio Innova and the Spazi Attivi team opening the doors of their FabLab for insightful exchange. Thanks to the coordinator and hosts, and to the whole consortium for the energy that carried the two days.