South East Asia-Europe Network for building training and education capacities in Plastic Recycling in Laos and Vietnam with emphasis on quality, safety and resource efficiency

Plastic is a material stream showing a quick growth in South East Asia. To some extent the material stream ends up in recycling, however the established practices with informal collection and informal treatment lead to low quality products, and rises concern on Occupation Health & Safety issues as well as potential pollution to the environment and residents.The project SEA-PLASTIC-EDU aims at improving the dialogue between research and practice by establishing regional training hubs that serve as knowledge hub and interface. By this the quality of education is enhanced and employability is improved, both at University level and CPD-level. Further the training hubs support sustainable entrepreneurship considering all technical, environmental and social aspects of plastic recycling, that is required to deal with increasing quantities of plastics in an environmentally safe and sound manner. These goals are reached by:• Development of demand driven educational products with focus on plastic waste recycling, waste management & entrepreneurial skills. For this purpose, at academic education 3 new modules and modifications for 20 modules in the Bachelor and Master level have been done. For CPD training, three modules have been developed and implemented• Tackling cross cutting topics such as integrating informal collectors and related supportive organisations to address health, safety and socio-economic issues• Development of national University-Enterprise collaboration and trainings hubs for plastic waste recycling in Laos and VietnamBenefit from the project mainly will be provided through an improved value chain in recycling plastic waste. This creates local jobs; at the same time the pollution load is mitigated. Higher education institutions in South East Asia have included waste management and plastic recycling into their education programmes. The industrial partners use the results from the developed CPD products in their training activities. A focal point of these trainings will be the new established Collaboration and Training Hubs.