It feels like just yesterday that I was writing the October newsletter! That just goes to show how busy November has been for Circular Tayside.

This month started with a very circular theme-  the long awaited "Circular Economy Bill- Proposals for legislation" that became available for consultations on the 7th of November. We encourage everyone to offer their insight and to help shape the legislation that will be the basis of how we deal with waste professionally and personally. The process is quite simple- access the consultation here and go through the steps.

Most questions are preceded by an explanatory text and they cover:

-Executive powers for ministers to place charges on disposable items that are considered environmentally harmful. 

-Introducing compulsory reporting of surplus products or materials, such as textiles and foodstuffs, and encouraging them to move upwards on the waste hierarchy.

-Transitioning the city councils' voluntary Household Recycling Charter  towards a mandated model

- Allowing enforcement authorities to seize vehicles and issue penalty notices for waste crime.

- Requiring public bodies and authorities to state the ways in which they are carrying out their environmental sustainability commitments (i.e. regarding climate change and circular economy)  in their procurement strategies. 

Please take some time out of your day to consider these themes and offer your consultation. If you have any questions, comments or complaints about the Bill, send them over to Circular Tayside as we are keen to find out what challenges different sectors might be facing with its implementation.

As far as our own Circular Tayside Programme is concerned, our priority this month was to develop our Circular Tayside Ambassadors programme. In this direction, we met and chatted with several of them, discussing the role of the Ambassador and its scope. We are now reaching an understanding that the Circular Tayside Ambassadors are going to be individuals and/or business owners who are passionate about circular economy and recognise it as the economic model of the future and promote it through their own business products, models or partnerships. We will aim to have quarterly meetings in order to talk about our prospective sectors and the circular opportunities within them, and the innovations that are taking place. We are always looking for more ambassadors so if you want to join our team, be showcased on our website, and offer your insights in these meetings, please contact Circular Tayside.

Another project for this month has been the identification and grouping of local Tayside circular economy case studies and there are more than we expected! From Montrose to Rannoch and from Kinross to Blair Atholl, both our projects and operational range span widely. This month we managed to visit many of them in order to understand what they do, tell them what support is available, and present them on our website. This part of the job is one of my personal favourites as I get to understand the place, its businesses, and its people much better.

Some of these businesses I visited as part of the judging panel for the  STAR awards, a prestigious Perthshire Chamber of Commerce annual event that awards local businesses for being exemplary in their category. I was asked to accompany accomplished professionals in order to offer my opinion regarding the Contribution to Sustainability category, and I was very happy to meet with Muir Walker & Pride Architects and Interior Designers, Horsecross Arts, and Kinross Wooden Products Company who were the finalists in this category.

 All three organisations offered fantastic examples of how sustainability can be promoted both as a product as well as a business model as they not only offered a product that ticks the boxes but their actual operations as a business incorporated sustainability in their energy, resources and waste management systems. It was very difficult to choose between them and it took us around three days of discussions with the other judges.

We finally decided that between them all, Kinross Wooden Products Company would receive this year's STAR Awards "Contribution to Sustainability"  and I was very happy to present it to them at the glamorous STAR Awards ceremony organised by Perthshire Chamber of Commerce.

Although events such as the STAR awards are great, my primary goal is still to promote Circular Tayside to local organisations and in order to do that I attended several events this month such as the NFU Mutual "Circular Economy and Agriculture" event in Letham that had a great turnout with high numbers from the farming community. I was very happy to hear the presentation of Derek Stewart, one of our CT Ambassadors, presenting the hidden gems of agricultural waste.That presentation culminated in a meeting next month where I will be informed on agricultural plastic waste and the challenges farmers face in disposing of it, aiming to offer any available Zero Waste Scotland support.

I was also very happy to present Circular Tayside at an Angus Business Connections event in Friockheim and hear the locals' ideas.

The Angus Rural Roadshow provided more opportunity to meet with local rural enterprises and see what is happening in Angus. We were also happy to meet with Angus LEADER and their LEADER partners from Sweden as we exchanged circular economy best practice examples. An attendance at a Dundee and Angus Chamber of Commerce breakfast at Duncan Jordanstone College of Art and Design showed me that circular economy is already a well established concept in the college's curriculum, and the month was concluded with a presentation of the available support to local businesses at a GrowBiz event in Coupar Angus. There I met with a very inspirational panel including Jane Wilkinson, Training Officer with Forward Coupar Angus, that is developing an SQA Core Skills Unit targeting Climate Literacy, and Brenda Roddy co-owner of Jessie Mac's Hostel in Dunkeld which is accredited with the gold level in the Green Tourism Business Scheme.

So what is in the cards for December?

One issue that stood out during this really busy November was that of Circular Construction. I was lucky to meet and talk with several circular construction experts and find out about their own projects, as well as the future of the sector in Scotland. Although there is little in the form of legislation, and it is not yet a mainstream practice, the word is out there about circular construction, and I encounter it everywhere I go. Dundee Uni's architecture and planning department, local Angus architect firms, Zero Waste Scotland's experts, and property developers, are just a few of the people that I have discussed circular construction with in the last weeks. It seems that construction is one of those sectors with huge Circular Economy potential that is just waiting to be fulfilled. For example; there is this fantastic resource efficient house that opened in 2013 and in which everything- including the paint- is resource efficient and circular. I really recommend that you check it out as it is a great example of how it is possible to build a fully circular, fully functional building in Scotland with minimal CO2 footprint.

In light of that, I am meeting with a ZWS expert on circular construction as well as a local Angus based architecture firm to discuss the challenges designers and constructors face in implementing circular construction.

I am also meeting with various businesses and sectoral experts including the Economic Development team in Angus council to discuss how to assist Angus businesses to take full advantage of the support available, as well as the Royal Scottish Geographical Society in Perth to discuss a circular economy accreditation that they have been developing, and the Binn Ecopark (another one of our Ambassadors) in Perthshire to see the premises and find out about all the different types of plastic they can process.

Lastly, I will start designing the Circular Tayside Map. An interactive map which will be available on the Circular Tayside website, and will showcase the different circular organisations, ambassadors, and practices in our local area.

If you are interested in becoming an ambassador, showcasing your business as a case study or find out what financial and other support is available for your business contact me at vasomakri@circulartayside.co.uk

Stay tuned to find out how our December went and until then have a great Christmas and a fantastic New Year!