Transferring cleaner production to Eastern Europe: experiences from Cleaner Production Training Programme in Roslavl, Russia, 1998

Environmental issues still have low priority within industries and universities in countries from the former Soviet Union. There is a weak link between academic R&D and industrial application, which leads to innovative retardation and economic backwardness. A short course conducted by IIIEE in Russia introduced Cleaner Production (CP) to both audiences and helped to gain some valuable insight into these problems. CP is a discipline that should be introduced to all universities. It gives an opportunity to establish an industry-university link and has many attractive features for both academia and industry. CP, as a discipline, has little dependence on students' background, requires multidisciplinary group work, motivates personal responsibility, provides an ability to analyse problems and synthesise solutions and it is appreciated in all industrial sectors since it has substantial potential for economic benefits. This paper proposes an example of how CP can bring together academia and industry and lead to mutual benefits.