SEED at WRF2021: A showcase of policy solutions benefiting Africa’s circular economy MSMEs

  • September 29, 2021

As Programme Partner of the World Resources Forum 2021, SEED will organise and host the online workshop “A showcase of policy solutions benefiting Africa’s circular economy MSMEs”, as part of the circular economy conference track. In this short article, the workshop organisers tell us more about the context behind the session, what the workshop will be about and why you should attend it. Don’t miss it on the second day of WRF2021, October 13th, 15.30 – 16.20 CET!

 

 

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Let’s start with an introduction about SEED – what are your mission and activities?

SEED was founded at the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg by UN Environment, UNDP and IUCN as a global partnership for action on sustainable development and the green economy. SEED is based on the understanding that the promotion of social and environmental entrepreneurship is pivotal for environmentally friendly and socially inclusive development and poverty reduction.

We work directly with growing enterprises and aspiring entrepreneurs in our Enterprise Support programmes to strategise, optimise and award achievements in eco-inclusive entrepreneurship. All our participating enterprises receive a comprehensive SEED Support Package of tailored business and capacity-building support, networking, and profiling at the national and international level.

Complimentary to our direct Enterprise Support programmes, we offer programmes to build an ecosystem of supporters and advocators necessary to the success of growing enterprises. Our Ecosystem Building activities fortify a global network of local business development services providers and offer platforms for coordination between key local, national and international stakeholders. Our facilitation of multi-stakeholder engagement through SEED programmes generates policy, financing and collaboration instruments that multiply the social, environmental and economic impacts of entrepreneurship. We share extensive evidence of the value of eco-inclusive entrepreneurship to sustainable development with key stakeholders through publications and national and international events.

What will your workshop be about and what goals does it have?

SEED proposes an interactive workshop within the circularity stream, focused on discussing and generating ideas for favourable replicable local conditions for resource and circularity relevant SMEs. Building on insights from local MSMEs and its Practitioner Labs for Policy Prototyping, the workshop is looking at lessons learnt to build national policy frameworks bottom-up. The interactive showcase will see SEED and regional policy champions present existing and prospective policy solutions with national and regional relevance. All solutions benefit circular MSMEs which have adopted innovative business models that prioritise renewable inputs, extended product use, recovery of byproducts and waste, and regeneration of natural systems, thus ensuring valuable resources live on in innovative products and services.

An MSME case study of the policy challenges and solutions will be followed by Q&A with speakers to take inspiration from or build out these prototypes and apply them to various contexts. After a policy case study on Ghana’s waste policy and draft solution, there will be an interactive polling and input on further regional solutions for replication and partnership.

SEED aims to foster regional collaboration and networks of public and private partners. Our aim is for these stakeholders to learn and exchange on resource and circularity relevant policy solutions in development or already proven. The stakeholders engaged include national policy makers, circularity MSMEs and development partners working on entrepreneurship. The speakers of the workshop will be:

  • Arab Hoballah, SEED Executive director
  • Bernadette Dzifa Agbefu, Civil Engineer, SEED Awards 2021 winner in Ghana
  • Wisdom Adongo, Senior Project Officer, Private Enterprise Federation
  • Lititia Abra-Kom Nyaaba, Deputy Director at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
  • ICCM Malawi (TBC)

What excites you about being a program partner of WRF2021?

WRF2021 is the premium forum for science-based conversations on system change in resource use and circularity. We believe that entrepreneurship is the key to sustainable development, poverty reduction and a transition to circular and inclusive economies. At this event, we hope to feed policy makers with ideas on how to use policy to unlock these contributions while giving MSMEs a platform to share with their peers how they have overcome policy-related challenges.

 

Finally, let’s conclude with a call for action. Why should participants attend your workshop and for whom would it be particularly interesting to attend?

SEED proposes to host an MSME Policy Collaboration Lab at the World Resources Forum to highlight the role of eco-inclusive enterprises can play towards an economy valuing waste and in its transition to a circular economy. Drawing on participatory methodologies, the Lab will facilitate an interactive discussion drawing on case studies, current policy solutions and future recommendations.

If you are a national policy maker or development partners working on green or circularity entrepreneurship, or an MSME in the circularity area, come and hear from SEED on recommendations towards policy frameworks fostering circular entrepreneurship and hear pitches on current and future policy-relevant frameworks and programmes benefiting MSMEs.

Useful links

SME stories – videos:

SEED Social Media:

 

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The World Resources Forum 2021 (WRF2021), under the theme of “A Green Deal for Sustainable Resources” will take place on October 12-14 in an innovative hybrid format: three days of online sessions and two small scale-events in Accra (Ghana) and Zürich (Switzerland). All the workshops, such as the one organised by SEED, together with all scientific sessions and plenary sessions will take place online, in a dedicated virtual event platform. WRF2021 is co-hosted by the Ghanaian Ministry for Environment, Science, Technology and Innovation (MESTI) and the Swiss Federal Office for the Environment (FOEN/BAFU).

Don’t miss the opportunity to be part of this exciting session and learn from all the participants.

Register now for WRF2021!