April 2008 : Successful CPSUC Kick-off meeting in Beijing

All partners and key experts under the ASIA-INVEST project 'CPSUC – Capacity Building and Establishment of Cleaner Production Service Units & Campaigns for the Industry in the Less Developed Regions of China' met end of March and beginning of April in Beijing to start this new three years lasting project, which will cover 11 of the less developed provinces in China.

From left: Mr. Colum Gibson (CTC), Dr. Gerhard Weihs (CAI), Dr. Peng Sizhen (ACCA 21) signing the project Terrms of reference.

The very successful Kick-off meeting could produce all targeted results:

o All project partners and all key players/experts of the international project team/partnership (Chinese & EU) became familiar with each other and gained an in-depth and commonly confirmed understanding of the project, its objectives, activities and expected results.

o The Terms of Reference (TOR) were fully understood and accepted by all partners as legal instrument for the project implementation; the TORs are signed by all partners.

o Potential risks and challenges were sufficiently discussed and strategies how to overcome potential problems were developed.

o A plan on how to approach and engage local counterparts in the 11 provinces was made and agreed.

o How to recruit trainers from all 11 provinces was developed and agreed.

o The details of the opening conference were fixed.

o A plan for the first step of the main implementation phase, which is the instruction training for new CP trainers, was developed and preliminary agreed.

o The training manual to be used was selected.

o The responsibilities to set up and run the project web in English and Chinese were agreed.

o All results and conclusions of the kick-off meeting leading to further actions were written into an action plan for the forthcoming periods outlining tasks, responsibilities, expected results and time planning.