For the People,
by the People

ECONGUSTO – sapore sostenibile, futuro inclusivo

Project ‘Econgusto – sustainable taste, inclusive future’ was born from the collaboration between U.Di.Con. APS – Union for the Defence of Consumers National Headquarters and the project partners: U.Di.Con. Emilia Romagna APS; AVES Associazione Volontariato Europeo Solidale; U.Di.Con. Lazio Regional APS; U.Di.Con. Marche Regional APS; U.Di.Con. Regional Apulia APS; U.Di.Con. REGIONAL Sicily APS; U.Di.Con. REGIONALE CALABRIA APS financed by the Ministry of Labour and Social Policies with Notice no. 2/2023 D.G. of the third sector and corporate social responsibility Fund for the financing of projects and initiatives of general interest in the third sector art. 72 Legislative Decree no. 117/2017 as amended.

The project aims to reduce food and consumption waste while also minimising socio-economic inequalities. Econgusto responds to certain requirements and needs identified throughout the country such as:

• reduce consumers’ socio-economic inequalities;
• identifying and contacting consumers in fragile conditions also thanks to the involvement of operators and realities already existing on the territory;
• increase the level of knowledge on the circular economy: how citizens can adopt everyday behaviour with a socio-economic impact in favour of sustainability;
• improve and guarantee the accessibility of information and activities free of charge to all citizens on the project theme to reduce inequalities;
• activate actions affecting consumption and consumption habits of households in a fragile condition;
• implement information tools that can promote more responsible, aware and environmentally oriented consumption behaviour, which at the same time is attractive, as it can reduce family expenses e.g. by containing food waste, recycling raw materials, etc.; and
• improve the national food waste situation through information and practical activities that reduce the phenomenon in the long run;
• reduce fashion pollution and make consumers more aware of their choices in this area.

Thanks to the vast experience of the project partners and U.Di.Con. Nazionale, it was decided to propose a project that would support the sharing, dissemination and promotion of sustainable development and consumption practices that are fundamental to reducing inequalities and improving people’s quality of life. The idea is to assess the level of knowledge among the population on the theme of circular economy with a focus on food waste and sustainable consumption, and then move on to offer information, training and support actions in the long term on the themes of food waste, reuse and recycling of materials, inclusion and marginalisation.

In addition,

• each activity will be reproducible and scalable throughout the country;
• the use of social networks and targeted information campaigns will make it possible to bring citizens closer to the project’s themes and to promote virtuous behaviour, as well as to make the project and its tools and services widely known
• meetings on the territory dedicated to the project themes will be designed to promote awareness, inclusion and information among citizens;
• the national counters and the call-centre will constitute a capillary network on the territory that will be able to give concrete help to citizens to access possible bonuses, facilities, etc., preventing situations at risk of marginalisation.

Meetings will be organised in the territory through the organisation of food collection days, cooking and meal sharing with chefs and nutritionists who will prepare healthy and low-waste food; clothes collection days and exchanges will be organised to raise awareness on the issue of fast fashion; three episodes of the web series ‘Il condominio’ on the project theme will be produced; role playing will be organised to actively involve consumers as well as the recording of mini videos to inform the communication campaign throughout the territory.

CIRCE – Circular Energy and CIrcular Economy

NOTICE NO. 2/2023 FOR THE FUNDING OF INITIATIVES AND PROJECTS OF NATIONAL RELEVANCE PURSUANT TO ARTICLE 72 OF LEGISLATIVE DECREE NO. 117 OF 3 JULY 2017, AS AMENDED – YEAR 2023.

UNC APS – Unione Nazionale Consumatori project leader together with the partners U.Di.Con. APS – Unione per la difesa dei consumatori, ADOC APS, U.Di.Con. REGIONALE CALABRIA APS AND U.DI.CON. REGIONALE LAZIO APS, UNC Comitato di Faenza APS and ADOC ABRUZZO APS are implementing the CircE project, whose primary objective is to help fragile families facing this condition, through the activation of a network of competent and trained experts, to get out of energy poverty or at least to reduce the risk of entering it as much as possible. To this end, a network of desks of the proposing AACCs, present in the territories involved, will be set up in 19 regions. Their task will be to provide assistance to families in difficulty and to create a network of subjects capable of intercepting this type of fragile families, and to intervene on the problem through various channels and tools. Through the action of the desks and the network, households in energy poverty will be able to become recipients of the activities and application of good practices to optimise their energy consumption. The network of experts that will be created, which will include operators of the partner AACCs, but also volunteers and operators of third sector associations in the area working with fragile families or communities, will be trained through a training course that will issue a certificate for ‘Home Energy Tutor’ to participants, enabling them to work on the problem in the long term and in different contexts. In this way, a model of services will be created to meet a growing social need, while at the same time creating new relationships and new partnerships and increasing possibilities for action for the communities themselves. Through targeted actions and ad hoc tools, the CircE project also wants to promote the formation of a culture of sustainability and sustainable and responsible consumption.

In fact, the proposing AACCs consider it fundamental to promote prevention in order to try to reduce the risk of incurring a state of economic precariousness and consequently energy poverty. With the CircE – Circular Energy & Circular Economy project, they intend to develop an awareness-raising phase on issues such as sustainable consumption and budget management, reuse and recycling of end-of-life materials, food waste and the promotion of ‘km0’ by setting up training laboratories and workshops open to all citizen-consumers in the territories involved, with the aim of activating the much hoped-for ‘energy transition’ of households, which among its benefits also includes that of reducing energy, food, consumption costs, etc. The implementation of the network of counters and operators trained on energy poverty (CircE network), working synergistically, will make it possible to intercept the largest possible number of users and households in difficulty, offering them the opportunity to improve their consumption behaviour and their socio-economic condition, and at the same time, to collect in-depth data on the phenomenon also at territorial level (data on the types of households affected, territorial distribution, consumption behaviour and patterns, etc.). These data, which will be collected by the desks open in the territory, will serve as monitoring and will be processed and made available thanks to a report that will be disseminated in the territories involved. Indeed, the activation of the network will make it possible to develop a monitoring and analysis of different territorial realities and to identify households in a state of energy poverty and vulnerability.

SAFE – Safe Food Advocacy Europe, together with a consortium of partners from across Europe including the Consumer Education
and Information Center (Croatia), the Lithuanian Consumer Institute (Lithuania), the Union for Working Consumers of Greece
(Greece), the Consumers Defense Union (Italy), Amici Obesi (Italy) and Promote Ukraine (Belgium), have developed a 3-year duration project entitled “Preventia” with the overarching aims to:
– Reduce health inequalities across the EU;
– Decrease the spreading of NCDs across the EU,
– Foster cooperation and exchanges between the EU Member States.
Through a set of relevant Work Packages and tasks, the project will unfold according to 3 main dimensions: Capacity-building and
training, Networking and cooperation and Campaigning and awareness-raising.
The project’s specific objectives are to:
– Enhance the cooperation and peer-learning of civil society across the EU in the fight against NCDs, with a special emphasis on
stakeholders from Ukraine;
– Encourage the exchanges and best practices and mobility opportunities of health and nutrition workforce across the EU;
– Improve health literacy of younger generations on NCDs prevention through training on healthy eating habits and childhood
obesity;
– Reduce health inequalities across the EU (and beyond) through inclusive activities for vulnerable groups;
– Raise awareness of citizens at large through participatory and interactive campaigns;
– Empower consumers to make better informed and more nutritious food choices through innovative digital tools;
– Analyse and assess national policies related to NCDs prevention;
– Advocate for new EU policy approaches based on the Member States’ needs;
– Widely and effectively communicate about the project and give visibility to its activities;
– To promote and disseminate the project deliverables among targeted audience across the EU.

The project “Our Common Culture” is proposed by U.Di.Con. and it is realized by Ministero dell’Ambiente e della Sicurezza Energetica as a part of the implementation process National Strategy for Sustainable Development. The project aims at promoting the Culture of Sustainability following the principle of Development Economics, according to which it is essential to guarantee equal access to the fundamental capabilities of each person. Precisely for this reason, “Our Common Culture” will be implemented in a district of Rome, Corviale, and in a district of Reggio Calabria, Arghillà, where the socio-economic situation negatively affects the access to basic capabilities. Some of the activities will be carried out in collaboration with ISPRA – Istituto Superiore per la Protezione e la Ricerca Ambientale that, thanks to the website facciamocircolare.it, by which U.Di.Con. already cooperates thanks to other projects funded by the MiSE, its network, and its researchers, it will be supportive to all the training workshops, events and communication activities and dissemination of data and actions. Furthermore, all the Cultural Associations of the neighborhoods are involved in order to reach as many citizens as possible and in order to implement a network of work and collaboration that starts directly from the territory.

The topics of the project are:

• food waste
• sustainable consumption
• reuse and recycling

The main objectives of the project aim at:

• Raising awareness of the UN SDG framework and highlighting the intrinsic interconnections between culture and the Sustainable Development Goals
• Educating on conscious consumption by making consumers aware of a targeted purchase by focusing on quality
• Guaranteeing to all citizens, with particular reference to those who come from the most marginalized communities, a mobilization path to strengthen active citizenship
• Achieving the objectives proposed in the field of sustainable development, so that young people have the opportunity to share reflections and ideas to make their local area more sustainable, open and inclusive

Project realized by the Ministry of the Environment and Energy Security as part of the implementation process of the National Strategy for Sustainable Development

Food 4 Inclusion – SAFE

SAFE ‘s Food4Inclusion Project strives to make healthy diets accessible through ground projects such as food redistribution or healthy accessible meals in restaurants for people in need. SAFE is also advocating for better affordability of food products across Europe and for the social inclusion of at-risk and disadvantaged population groups. The Food4Inclusion Project aims to generate a positive impact on European citizens, especially disadvantaged ones, by providing independent information, developing relevant training, and encouraging the adoption of a new legislation that will lead to a more inclusive food system.

It is a project promoted by U.Di.Con. APS – Union for the defense of consumers, in collaboration with the AACC (Adoc, Cittadinanzattiva, Federconsumatori and UNC), which aims to improve the quality of citizens’ life through training and information actions based on the issues of digital transition and sustainable mobility. The project’s activities are aimed at all consumers with particular attention to those who are in socio-economic difficulty such as the unemployed, the unemployed, and the elderly.

The general objective of PeaSeNGO project is to combine the expertise of CNR as EEN partner and of U.Di.Con – Union for the Defense of Consumers- as NGO, to impact the environmental and social performance of three selected SMEs assisting them in their transition to more sustainable business model. The project scope is to enhance the interaction and improve collaboration between SMEs and NGOs/ CSOs, contributing to the achievement of the SDGs of United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, with regards to the three following Goals: Goal 8 – Decent Work and Economic Growth, with regard, Goal 10 – Reduce inequality within and among countries, Goal 11 – Sustainable Cities and Communities. To achieve these goals, PeaSeNGO provides the SMEs partner through CNR and Udicon, advisorsy services divided in three steps: 1) Company Needs Analysis – Preparatory visits (also remotely) and discussion with the SMEs to understand characteristics and needs of SME Partners in the domain of sustainability 2) Sustainability assessments – CNR and U.Di.Con will assess the current business model of the partner SMEs in collaboration with the EEN Sustainability Advisors and using proven, high quality methodologies/tool 3) Training/Workshop – In order to support SMEs in their sustainable transformation/evolution embracing the SDGs targets, U.Di.Con. will provide specific workshops and webinars both on green topics in which also customers will be invited to present to SMEs their requests and needs and on social issues in which the SMEs’ employees will be invited to discuss of the gender equality, fair internal procedures, privacy rules and other social topics with the SMEs’ management to improve the workplace. In addiction the project has the purpose to scale up further to reach other SMEs (already in EEN ecosystem), other NGOs/ CSOs, and other relevant actors/networks at regional/national/European level.

The project is a collaboration between U.Di.Con. and UNC and is funded by the Italian Ministry of Labour and Social Policy (pursuant to Art. 72, DD 03/07/2017 and subsequent amendments). The project aims at putting the consumer at the center, with particular reference to young and fragile people. Focus is on issues such as food education, circular economy, food waste and over-indebtedness. Information tools in this project involve a video game, webinars / meetings, web series, physical and virtual info points and a call center and two physical help desks. Project’s website provides information related to consumer services and to the project’s activities. Inclusivity is a key point, and information material and videos will be made available for the vision-impaired and for deaf people.

The project was funded by the Ministry of Economic Development (pursuant to the D.D. of 01/10/2018) and carried out in partnership by the fellow Associations Unione Nazionale Consumatori, U.Di.Con. and Movimento Difesa del Cittadino. It ended in March 2021 and intended to facilitate the relationship between consumers and consumer associations. Through initiatives throughtout the country and moments of discussion, we aimed to illustrate to citizens their rights and foster their awareness as consumers.