Quality Infrastructure for the Circular Economy Project – QI4CE

Project Q14CE

Objective:

The project encourages the cooperation of regional quality infrastructure organizations, namely the Pan American Standards Commission (COPANT), the Inter-American Accreditation Cooperation (IAAC) and the Inter-American Metrology System (SIM) along with their national membersin the field of the circular economy. They will strengthen their technical competencies and in addition stakeholders of the circular economy will be sensitized on the benefits of the quality infrastructure.

Approach:

Many countries in Latin America and the Caribbean have achieved considerable success in their economic and social development in recent decades. However, economic growth has so far been associated with high social and environmental costs and caused high energy and resource consumption. This exacerbates the numerous environmental problems in the region.

In order to solve these challenges in the long term, a shift from a linear economy to a circular economy is required. Applying the circular economy concept increases the resource efficiency of economic activity through waste prevention, repair, reuse, remanufacturing and recycling, thus minimizing use of resources. For the transition towards a circular economy, supporting services of the quality infrastructure are necessary.

The contributions of the various components of the quality infrastructure - standardization, metrology, accreditation and conformity assessment - are important prerequisites to support research for new materials and products, develop innovative technologies and to determine reliably and comparably the environmental impacts of production and consumption patterns.

Sectorally, the project focuses on the promotion of value-added cycles in food, plastics and construction and aims to identify and strengthen the potential contributions of quality infrastructure within these. The regional focus will allow the experience of working from individual value cycles to be expanded.

The project is implemented with the Organization of American States (OAS) as the lead political partner and the regional quality infrastructure organizations: COPANT, IAAC and SIM which constitute the Quality Infrastructure Council of the Americas (QICA), as the technical project partners.

Impact:

The project seeks to strengthen the competences of the quality infrastructure, which are needed for the development of services in the field of circular economy. To this end, the cooperation and networking of the actors in the quality infrastructure and the circular economy will first be promoted and monitored.

Through events and publications like policy documents, strategies and documents from sector initiatives, the project conveys to decision-makers from politics, private sector and civil society the relevance of quality infrastructure for sustainable development.

By the end of the project, the quality infrastructure institutions should be able to support the circular economy through new or adapted contributions like tailor made consultancies, normative documents, tests, calibrations and certifications.

Cooperation

The project coordinates its activities closely with other donors active in the region in similar working areas.

Financing

Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), Germany Term 10/2020 until 09/2023 (3 years)

Contact

Partner Institutes OAS | César Parga

+1 202 370-5421