C-En: Circular Entrepreneurship for Unemployed Women

<< Background >>The project was born to address two identified challenges in society: unemployment, especially among women, and the need to transition to a more sustainable economy. The COVID-19 pandemic left a situation of economic disparity in several European countries, aggravating the problem of unemployment, especially among women. Therefore, the partners realised the need to develop initiatives that could empower the unemployed with the necessary skills and tools to enter the labour market, more specifically through circular entrepreneurship. On the other hand, in today's business world, there is a crucial need to move towards a circular economy. This is due to the urgency of mitigating the environmental impact generated by rapid population growth and the consequent increase in demand for raw materials and massive waste generation.With the C-EN project we aimed to provide unemployed adults, especially women, with tools and resources for entrepreneurship, more specifically circular entrepreneurship, in order to tackle unemployment and at the same time address environmental issues.<< Objectives >>he main objective of the C-EN project was to provide unemployed adults, with a special focus on women, with a Good Practice Guide as a tool to raise awareness and encourage them to engage in sustainable entrepreneurship. During the project we aimed to foster entrepreneurship while raising awareness of sustainability and entrepreneurship within the framework of the circular economy, thus reducing unemployment rates and promoting sustainability.With the project we also wanted to collect best practice data on circular entrepreneurship, which would serve as inspiration for our target group, thus providing them with real examples that work. With this data we also aimed to raise awareness of the importance of adopting sustainable practices for companies to integrate into their workplaces, thus promoting positive changes in business, sustainability and leading to a reduction of environmental impact.<< Implementation >>Three activities were implemented in the project and are described below:Activity 1: Baseline evaluation. This activity aimed to create a tool to assess prior knowledge about how to start a business following a circular economy. Under the leadership of DISORA, an initial evaluation was designed to measure this knowledge, which allowed us to adapt our future actions.Activity 2: Collection data and development of Good Practice Guide: Under the leadership of NTW, the partners collected data and developed a Good Practice Guide with 15 real examples of entrepreneurs following a circular economy. This guide was adapted to a video interview format to offer a more interactive and motivational content and is available both on the project website and on the Youtube channel.Activity 3: Final assessment and dissemination. With Skill Up as leader, this activity involved the elaboration of a final questionnaire by DISORA to assess the knowledge acquired by the participants, as well as the presentation of the Good Practices Guide. To this end, each partner held an event where the initial knowledge of the participants was measured, the developed guide was presented and finally the final knowledge was evaluated.<< Results >>The specific results of the project were as follows:Pre-assessment questionnaire of knowledge on circular entrepreneurship.Evaluation by 15 experts of the pre-assessment of knowledge. Common report with the conclusionsGuide of Good Practices in circular entrepreneurship in PDF format with 15 examples, 5 per partner, available in English, Spanish, Italian and SlovenianVideo interviews with the 15 entrepreneurs in their national language and with subtitles in the other four languages (EN, IT, SL and ES)Final evaluation questionnaire on circular entrepreneurship knowledge.Evaluation by 15 experts of the final knowledge assessments. Common report with the conclusions obtained.Workshops for the presentation of the Good Practices Guide with a total of 38 participants.National reports with the results of the previous evaluations. Common report with the resultsNational reports of the workshops and final evaluations. Common report with conclusionsReports on each of the activities after completionWeb page: in four languages, includes information and materials on the project4 newsletters on the project and its evolutionMultiplier events: with 94 participants in totalProject social networks: 126 publications and a reach of 5157