Composting brought Prague 10 an international innovation award
photo: City Hall Prague 6/Community composter, illustration image
Community composters have been operating in Prague 10 for thirteen years. In addition, the town hall provides them for free in private gardens and also takes care of continuous education. This year, thanks to this, she won the International Innovation Award.
The office of the tenth city district entered the category Innovation with an environmental focus in the International Innovation Award competition. It is announced every year by Excellence Finland and organized for the Czech Republic by the Czech Society for Quality. It informs about it website Prague 10.
“We called our project Composting for waste-free Prague 10, and that already shows how seriously and conceptually we approach it. We consider the biological method of converting bio-waste, which is composting, to be one of the effective ways of measuring waste minimization, i.e. the reuse of presumed waste,” explains Jana Hatalová, secretary of the ÚMČ Prague 10.
A network of community composters was established in Desítka
The town hall tries to devote itself to composting in a long-term and systematic way. For example, it is developing a community formula for this waste treatment, from which a whole network of community composters has already been created. For the second time, it also participates in a subsidy program, thanks to which it offers citizens free wooden or plastic composters.
The issue of composts was also addressed by Desítky’s extensive communication campaigns focused on ecology and waste management. Last year, April without waste became the Communal Project of 2021 in the Ecological Project category. This year, it was followed by Ten without waste.
Both campaigns covered a number of discussions for proper waste management. They informed about how to reduce the volume of waste, how to sort it correctly or how to completely prevent its creation. there are dozens of text and visual information materials in digital and printed form.
The best waste is that which is not generated
Composting was also dedicated to special counseling sessions within the farmer’s market, there was a composting workshop in a kindergarten, a meeting of community composter administrators, an Earth Day event in Malešice, Reuse Saturday was held twice, and the last project was the improvement of the surroundings of community composters in Lvovská and Nučická streets.
Young people also got involved
In the spring, a School Forum was established, in which active young people from 12 to 16 years of age from various schools from the tenth city district participate. Together they determined the topics of their interest. One of them is waste-free and composting.
“Bottom line: We realize that the best waste is the one that is not created, which is indisputably true in the case of organic residues from the operation of home gardens. And I’m very happy that it’s a topic that is of great interest to experts, citizens and the next generation, and to which the staff of our office is primarily devoted,” summarized Jana Hatalová.
The international award evaluates usability in practice as well as effectiveness
The International Innovation Award examines and compares the innovations of companies from an international perspective. Innovativeness in the sense of the degree of novelty and applicability in practice, as well as efficiency and customer orientation, are evaluated above all. Czech Society for Quality has been mediating this award since 2013.
The purpose of the competition is to increase the number and qualitative level of innovation, increase the competitiveness of the participants and raise awareness of the award-winning organizations and their work. Competitions are held according to the size of the organizations (micro-enterprises, small and medium-sized organizations, large organizations), according to the sector (business or public), and special awards are also given to innovations with a positive impact on society.