Productive joint stakeholder discussion workshop of the WASTEWISE project
On 27 May 2026, a joint stakeholder discussion workshop took place in Donostia, hosted by the consortium partners from Elhuyar. 35 people joined, combining both consortium partners and stakeholders involved in the five Multi-Actor Platforms established within the project in the countries where it operates, namely Italy, Romania, Switzerland, Spain, and the Nordic Region, covering Sweden and Finland. A very cooperative and participatory atmosphere dominated the entire meeting.
This workshop offered a unique opportunity to share ideas and approaches to reducing food waste that are currently being implemented in different countries. Representatives from different ministries and other public administrations, foundations and other initiatives in the field of food waste prevention worked together for the whole day.
Among the topics discussed were the presence or lack of a budget at the country level for addressing food waste; the challenges and opportunities in the field of food waste management; the steps that have or will be taken at the national level to comply with the EU requirements of reducing food waste, and the main incentives and penalties that might be established in this regard.
Measures for future national food waste prevention plans were proposed, discussed, and detailed, along with indicators for assessing the impact of food waste regulations and brainstormed actions for campaigns aimed at increasing awareness and inducing behavioural change. Very interesting ideas and insights arose in this interactive activity, which will serve to inspire future project results and recommendations.
The last activity of the day was a participatory session for the validation of the Priority Matrix for food waste developed within WASTEWISE. Perspectives and feedback of participants were gathered regarding the importance of different indicators to identify the most important food categories related to food waste quantity, their environmental impact, their nutritional importance and economic impact.
