Repair Café is a movement that organises gatherings (in cities or villages) where citizens can come with broken stuff or objects. Clothing, bicycles, furniture, electric equipment,…During the gatherings skilled people (volunteers from the neighbourhood) will fix the stuff and objects for free. Citizens realize that objects and stuff can be fixed instead of throwing it away. In addition, during the organisation of a Repair Café people from the neighbourhood get to know each other better or come into contact with neighbours they never saw before.
A number of citizens have asked Repair Café to provide them with support to set up a Repair Café in their neighbourhood. In Belgium around 150 Repair Cafés are established and active at the moment.
Link to H2020 SI Priorities
Strategic intelligence and citizens’ participation
Eco-solutions to reduce raw materials use
Raw materials conscious sustainable lifestyle
SI Type
Governance - By providing citizens with material (information, guidelines about how to organise Repair Cafés etc.), Netwerk Bewust Gebruiken targets the engagement of citizens in the transition to a more sustainable society . It are citizens themselves that decide to start organising Repair Cafés. Repair Café is therefore a new form of citizen engagement in the area of reducing the use of raw materials, promoting a sustainable lifestyle etc.
Social (incl. behavioural) - social need: stuff and objectives get broke so rapidly. what to do with that? throw it away?
SI Objectives
to reduce consumption
to raise awareness about consumption patterns
to strengthen social cohesion
SI Origin
Netwerk Bewust Verbruiken (NBV) is the Flemish partner of the Dutch Stichting Repair Café. NBV started in 2013 to dessiminate the concept of a Repair Cafe in Brussels and Flanders. Thanks to the support of the ’Prins Filipfonds’ and of the province of Vlaams-Brabant, Repair Cafés were piloted in the province of Vlaams-Brabant. Int he meanwhile, more than 50 Repair Cafés are spread across Flanders and Brussels. Since the fall of 2013, Repair Café receives support from the Flemish government.
SI Factors of success
Economic - a way to save money (get it repared instead of buying new stuff)
Environmental - too much waste production
Political - financial support from the province of Vlaams Brabant and the Flemisch government
Social - social need: stuff and objectives get broke so rapidly. what to do with that? throw it away?
Spatial / Urban - A Repair Café is also a social happening, it brings people from a neighbourhood together.
Sources
Primary - website + contact through e-mail + documents they sent to us
