Cultural and creative industries (CCIs) are at the heart of the creative economy: represent a 6.8% of GDP in Europe and 6.5% of EU workforce, approximately 14.0 million. The Ecodesign Working Plan 2016-2019 contributes to the Commission’s new initiative on the Circular Economy, which promotes a transition towards a more circular economy in the EU. Product design is a key aspect in this respect and in future, Ecodesign should make a much more significant contribution to the circular economy (Ecodesign Working Plan 2016- 2019.EC).

CCIs, like all other industries, are dependent on the material world. Reuse, repurposing, recycling or upcycling are all examples of a broad and unstoppable movement which is reevaluating and maximising resource value through Ecodesign. At the 2nd Green Skills Forum 2014, OECD LEED-Cedefop presented some key challenges for meeting skill needs for green jobs, evidencing that there is an urgent need to support green job skills development strategies in order to prevent the emergence skills bottlenecks in our countries, supporting VET acquisition of Ecodesign and a smooth transition from brown to green jobs.

There is also strong evidence that Work-Based Learning (WBL) helps to equip young people with the skills that can improve their employability and ease the transition from school to work. Nevertheless, existing analysis and policy papers in the countries of the project (France, Greece, Italy, Ireland, Malta, Spain and UK) evidence that there is still too much distance between the educational environment and the workplace in these countries.

Ecodesign4EU project aims to address these challenges designing a new European ECVET Curriculum of reference on Ecodesign for sustainable CCIs, promoting innovative WBL methods and pedagogies addressed to Initial and Continuous VET students, target beneficiaries of the project, in order to acquire and apply Ecodesign principles to CCIs, contributing to lead the transition to a Circular Economy in these sectors. The project will also apply successful and innovative VET methods and tools in Ecodesign principles applied to CCIs, previously tested by the partners.