International Compost Awareness Week - European Compost Network

International Compost Awareness Week (ICAW) is the largest and most comprehensive education initiative of the organics recycling industry.

It is celebrated in many countries throughout the world annually during the first full week of May. Started in Canada over twenty-five years ago, ICAW has continued to grow as more people, businesses, municipalities, schools and organizations are recognizing the importance of organics recycling and compost use.

This year, the annual week-long event will be held on May 5^th – 11^th. During the week, thousands of volunteers around the world will hold educational activities working together to get the word out about the many benefits of recycling organics and the importance of returning organic matter – compost – back to our soils. The program includes poster and video contests in the fall and activities and events held during the week in May. Throughout the week of ICAW, community and business events are held to encourage and celebrate composting - all types of composting – from backyard to large-scale are promoted.

The 2024 International Compost Awareness Week (ICAW) theme is truly a collaborative and international effort. Again this year, we teamed up with the International Compost Alliance (ICA), which includes compost associations from around the world, to select: COMPOST... Nature’s Climate Champion!
The theme was chosen by participating international partners incorporating the collective focus on one of the initiatives of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), which is “Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts.”
The 2024 theme best reflects the UN goal by highlighting the role compost plays in fighting climate change. Those roles include:

Decreasing methane: Methane, a greenhouse gas twenty-five times as powerful as carbon dioxide, can be significantly reduced through the recycling of organics instead of their being landfilled.
Helping with climate change mitigation: Compost offers a significant answer to climate change mitigation. Compost's return to the soil serves as a "carbon bank", helping to store carbon thereby removing it from the atmosphere.
Reducing fertilizer inputs, reducing the pollution created by manufacture those inputs
Increasing resilience: Compost helps to increase resilience to the effects of climate change such as drought and extreme weather.

Please celebrate the International Compost Awareness Week with us and please start to plan your event now!

ECN Member Activitys in ICAW 2023

Spain - Waste Agency of Catalonia:

This year for the ICAW 2023, the Waste Agency of Catalonia once again prepared a lot of activities in collaboration with local authorities, composting plants, private & public operators, farmers, schools, universities, research centers, and other stakeholders. Some examples are: