Time for Change: Responsible Supply Chains in the Cyprus Context - Conference 19/01/2017

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Time for Change: Responsible Supply Chains in the Cyprus Context
Time for Change: Responsible Supply Chains in the Cyprus Context
Project Supply Cha!nge, Make Fruit Fair!
Place Classic Hotel, Nicosia, Cyprus
Date(s) 19 January 2017
Type of participants representatives of public, private and civil society sectors, students, other professionals
Number of participants <40
Total Duration 1 day
Link(s) https://www.facebook.com/events/649132828600606/



Description

The Conference "Time for Change: Responsible Supply Chains in the Cyprus Context" was organised as a common event of the Global Education Unit of Future Worlds Center and CARDET, within the framework of their EU-funded projects Supply Cha!nge, Make Fruit Fair! and Stop Mad Mining, and was placed under the auspices of the Global Education Week, Ministry of Education and Culture and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

The main focus of the conference were the supply chains of supermarkets' own store brand products, tropical fruit (bananas and pineapples) and metallic raw materials (gold, tin, tungsten, tantalum), as some of the most problematic global supply chains within global trade. The impact of these supply chains on a social (e.g. human rights violations, poor working conditions, etc.) and environmental (loss of biodiversity, soil degradation, carbon footprint etc.) level is huge. Many international and European initiatives have been attempting to regulate this conditions, but in order to achieve more responsible and sustainable supply chains, a holistic effort and commitment needs to be achieved in a local, european and international level.

The conference featured expert speakers Sophia Pickles from Global Witness UK, Martin Windenberg from Global2000 Austria, as well as Dr. Charalambos Theopemptou, Member of the Cyprus House of Representatives, Deputy President of the Parliamentary Committee on the Environment, who addressed the topic of supply chains, the issues behind them and the current policy developments at an international and European level. Exploring the local context was also a big part of the event, discussing the impact of such harmonisation in a local level, highlighting the need for a multi-stakeholder collaboration to this end.

​A Panel Discussion with questions from the participants followed, were more in depth discussions and concrete action points and recommendations were put through. The last session of the conference, split the participants in two groups to discuss more specifically food and metallic raw material topics.

The Conference overall was very successful in terms of a multi-stakeholder participation, and through the quality of discussions and recommendations derived from the keynote speeches, panel discussion and workshops during the event.

Program

8:30 - 9:00 Fair Breakfast and Registration

9:00 - 9:30 Welcoming speeches

  • Kerstin Wittig Fergeson - Head of Global Education Unit, Future Worlds Center (FWC)
  • Theocharis Michail - Project Officer/ researcher. CARDET

9:30 - 10:30 Keynote speeches - ‘Setting the framework of Supply Chains

  • Sophia Pickles - Global Witness (UK)
  • Martin Wildenberg - Global2000 (AT)

10:30 – 11.00 Keynote speech ‘Is Cyprus catching up?’

  • Charalambos Theopemptou Member of the Cyprus House of Representatives, Deputy President of the Parliamentary Committee on the Environment, Lecturer at the Department of Environmental Science and Technology of the Cyprus University of Technology

11:00 - 11:30 Fair Coffee Break

11:30 - 12:30 Discussion/ Q&A - The contribution of civil society and academia towards the modernisation of policies around supply chains

  • Sophia Pickles
  • Martin Wildenberg
  • Charalambos Theopemptou

12:30 - 13:30 Parallel Thematic Workshops/ Discussions

  • Raw Materials
  • Tropical Fruit and Store Brand Products

13:30 - 14:00 Presentation of recommendations & Wrap Up

14:00 – 14:30 Light lunch & Networking


Gallery

External Links

  • Supply Cha!nge Website [1]
  • Make Fruit Fair! Website [2]
  • Stop Mad Mining [3]