ITA
This toolkit is one of the outputs of the «CEYOU: Circular Economy for Youth» project, KA2 Strategic Partnership 2019-2-UK01-KA205-062208 co-funded by the European Commission under the Erasmus+ Programme. The CEYOU project intends to empower and engage young people around the circular economy as a means to deal with contemporary challenges such as the danger to the environment and climate change.

More information: ceyou.eu
Project Partners:
Pontydysgu Ltd (Wales)
ACR+ (Belgium)
Youth Express Network (France)
Active Citizens Partnership (Greece)
UCSA (Italy)
CID (North Macedonia)


The European Commission's support for the production of this publication does not constitute an endorsement of the contents, which reflect the views only of the authors, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein. Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0). You are free to adapt, share, copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format. You must give appropriate credit and may not use the material for commercial purposes. If you remix, transform, or build upon the material, you must distribute your contributions under the same license as the original.

Online Resources for your Circular Initiatives

Curated by UCSA - Ufficio Comune per la Sostenibilità Ambientale.
The aim of this toolkit is to empower young Circular Economy practitioners who want to implement an initiative following the principles of circular economy (CE). It is intended to guide them through the wide range of Open Educational Resources (OERs) already available online but spread over different web pages and websites. The toolkit organizes them following the different phases of project realization - from inspiration, to ideation and implementation, and can be used both individually and in groups, Just follow the steps and choose the most appropriate OERs for realising your idea in a Circular perspective. The resources selected are of four types - textual contents, videos, tools and mixed content - and they are marked with different icons in order to enable users to choose the most useful resources effectively.
This toolkit is targeted to those at the start of their journey, who want to ideate a product or a service, but many of the selected resources can also be useful in realizing activities and events in the field of Circular Economy. Since the latter topic is the main focus of the second output of the CEYOU project, Training Programmes And Activities For Young People On Circular Economy designed by Youth Express Network (France), we advice to consult this document for more in-depth information regarding this topic. In particular the reader can find at least three opportunities for in-depth study: firstly, it contains theoretical information on the concept of Circular economy and useful inspirational materials, adding up to the ones presented in the toolkit Online Resources for your Circular Initiatives; secondly, it includes tips and training programmes that could contribute to developing skills and competences of Young Circular Ideators; thirdly, it contains a wide range of tools, examples of activities and information about how to effectively organize a Circular Economy event around the development of the product or a service.
The Steps of Your Journey:
Group 13 B R AIN S T ORM! IDE A TE! WH O ’ S Y OUR A UDIENCE? MAKE A V A L UE P R O P O SITION! CI R CU L ARI T Y CHECK! T ES T IT! WH A T ’ S Y OUR S T O R Y ? G E T INSPIRED! CHO O SE Y OUR CHALLENGE! HAN D S ON A BUSIN E SS P L AN! IMPLEMENT!

Welcome on Board!

Eager to ideate an environmentally-friendly product, service, launch a cause or an event following the principles of Circular Economy? Then this guide is for you!

It will accompany you in the journey through the vast jungle of online tools and resources useful for developing an initiative that would contribute to shaping a more sustainable world.

From inspiration to implementation, this guide will make your idea take off in just 10 simple steps.

Note: Each resource is marked with an icon, specifying types of content, that you will find in the website:

  • Textual Materials
  • Videos
  • Pratical Tools
1/10

Get Inspired!

Looking for inspiration for going Circular? The following resources will introduce you to a wide range of opportunities regarding developing business ideas and other activities in a Circular perspective.

ASK NATURE

Inspirational materials for solving design problems in a regenerative way.

PRECIOUS PLASTIC

A global initiative to tackle the plastic waste problem.

FASHION FOOTPRINT CALCULATOR

Does your closet contribute to climate change? Find out with a fashion footprint calculator.

FASHION REVOLUTION

A campaign platform for a clean, safe, fair, transparent and accountable fashion industry.

THE STORY OF STUFF

A short animated documentary and useful resources about the lifecycle of material goods.

THE TRUE COST MOVIE

A documentary about the garment industry and the problems caused by the fast fashion business.

FASHION OPEN STUDIOS

Videos from the studios, highlighting designers who are actively working to find solutions to the key challenges regarding sustainable clothes production.

2/10

Choose Your Challenge!

Did you know that by developing your idea in a Circular perspective you can contribute to making a positive shift in your community towards a more healthy, happy, balanced lifestyle? These resources will help you to frame the problem that you want to help tackle by launching your Circular activity – a product, a service, an event or a cause.

UNDERSTANDING THE PROBLEM

A visual guide to understanding the contemporary issues that can be addressed by adopting Circular logic in your activity.

MAPPING THE BENEFITS OF CIRCULAR ECONOMY

An overview of contexts where a Circular intervention could be more than useful.

ARE WE SOLVING A RIGHT PROBLEM

An article that will help you to articulate problems that you would like to focus on by developing your initiative.

3/10

Brainstorm!

It’s time to brainstorm and highlight the Circular opportunities around your idea. There are no bad ideas and the more ideas you come up with in this phase - the better!

FINDING CIRCULAR OPPORTUNITIES

Steps to take in order to make your product, service or organisation more circular.

CIRCULAR FUTURE

Choosing your approach to Circularity: methods and examples.

BRAINSTORM RULES

Simple rules about how to brainstorm effectively.

SYSTEMS MAPPING

A guide to systematic thinking that will enable you to explore various circular opportunities for your initiative.

CIRCULAR BRAINSTORMING

Learn how to brainstorm ideas around the principles of circularity.

4/10

Ideate!

In this phase, you will learn how to develop a concrete idea that would bring value to your audience within the framework of Circular Economics.

CIRCULAR DESIGN TOOLKIT

A selection of tools and resources for successful designing according to the principles of circularity.

CIRCULAR SERVICE DESIGN

How to shift from product to service in order to make the best out of the circular opportunities for your initiative.

HOW TO ORGANIZE A GREEN EVENT

Tools, best practices and courses of action for organising eco-friendly, low-waste events.

MATERIALWISE

Data-driven insight to help you avoid problematic ingredients from the beginning of the ideation process.

SAFE AND CIRCULAR MATERIAL CHOICES

Choosing the right materials for circular products and initiatives.

5/10

Who’s Your Audience?

Next step – defining who will benefit from your idea and how. It will help you shape your activity in order to meet the real needs of audiences.

USER CENTERED RESEARCH

A short guide about how to gain empathy about people you are developing your idea for.

MAKE YOUR AUDIENCE PERSONA

A tool that will help you to identify your audiences and gain insights about their needs, desires, fears and expectations.

AUDIENCE JOURNEY

A tool that will help you to understand your audiences’ needs, wishes, and beliefs about your product/service/initiative.

6/10

Make a Value Proposition!

Formulating a value proposition for your audiences is useful to understand what features, functionalities, characteristics your product/service/initiative should have in order to meet their needs and expectations.

COMPELLING VALUE PROPOSITIONS

Tips on how to write catching value propositions for your audiences.

VALUE PROPOSITION CANVAS

A tool that will help you to identify key-features of our product/service or initiative that will make it relevant to your audiences.

7/10

Hands on a Business Plan!*

*if developing a business idea is not relevant to you, you can skip this step.

You have reached one of the most important steps of this journey: writing your business plan. It is a document, containing a synthetic description of what you intend to do to in order to achieve your goals and how you are going to do it. This tool will help you to structure your business idea in a way that is sustainable economically, socially and environmentally.

5 BUSINESS MODELS DRIVING CIRCULAR ECONOMY
10 CIRCULAR BUSINESS MODEL EXAMPLES
CIRCULAR BUSINESS MODEL CANVAS
8/10

Circularity Check!

Doing well! You have completed 7/10 steps towards implementing your Circular idea. It is time to check whether your idea, as it is now, still meets the parameters of Circularity. Better now than too late, here are some Circularity checklists!

CIRCULAR BUSINESS MODEL CHECKLIST

A tool that will help you to verify whether your business model is effectively following the principles of Circularity.

WHAT IS SWOT ANALYSIS?

An introductory video about a SWOT (Stenghts, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats) analysis tool.

SWOT ANALYSIS TOOL

Use a SWOT Analysis Template to note your idea’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.

9/10

What’s Your Story?

Good job! You have developed your idea, defined your potential audiences and developed your business plan. But there is still an important puzzle to be solved: how do you engage with your audiences? How will you communicate your value proposal? This chapter will help you to develop effective communication for your initiative.

COMMUNICATING YOUR CIRCULAR ECONOMY MESSAGE

Tips on how to effectively communicate the urgency and the value of your project.

CREATING YOUR BRAND PROMISE

A simple tool that will help you to formulate your key-message for your communication campaign.

CIRCULAR STORIES

A selection of compelling storytelling examples of the initiatives developed around the principles of Circular Economy.

DIGITAL STORYTELLING TOOLKIT

A toolkit, that will give you useful information on how to use video/filmmaking to communicate your idea in an engaging way.

HOW TO WRITE A COMMUNICATION PLAN

A guided toolkit that will help you to define your communication strategy and communication plan (to whom, via which channels and what message you have to convey in order to reach your potential audiences).

THREE STEPS TO A SUCCESSFUL CIRCULAR ECONOMY PITCH
THE PITCH CANVAS
SUSTAINABLE BUSINESS IDEA PITCH EXAMPLE
10/10

Test It!

One last step before launching your idea: verify your assumptions by introducing a simplified version of your product or service to your end users.

IDEA VALIDATION
5 STEPS TO VALIDATE YOUR BUSINESS IDEA IN THE REAL WORLD

Steps and tools on how to validate your idea before the launch.

RAPID PROTOTYPING

Verify your idea by creating a preliminary version of your product/service/event and testing it with end users.

FEEDBACK LOOPS

Plan a constant feedback scheme from your audiences to ensure the proposal remains relevant to them.