Last week, the DESIGN-MTS project partners offered a conference during the Lamiera 2014 exhibition, at the Bologna Fiere in Italy. The aim of the conference held on 15 May 2014 was to present to the different stakeholders present the multi-stakeholder platform of the project DESIGN-MTS – DEfining Social responsibility Interventions for a Grounded Networking in Machine Tools.

To open the conference, Benedetta Giovanola, assistant professor in Moral Philosophy at the University of Macerata and DESIGN-MTS project coordinator took the floor to present corporate social responsibility (CSR) and the project goals. She was followed by Emir Demircan, project manager at CECIMO (the European Association of the Machine Tool Industries) and project partner of DESIGN-MTS, who spoke about the European machine tool industry, underlining its global nature and the importance of sustainability for the growth of the sector. He also explained the different project objectives and deliverables.

Rossana Revello, coordinator of Confindustria CSR forum, Claudio Carlone, from the Green Mountain project on integrated sustainability approach at territorial level, and Enrico Annacondia, UCIMU (the association of Italian manufacturers of machine tools, robots, and automation systems) technical manager then each presented different Italian sustainability and CSR initiatives.

This conference served as a good platform to reach the project’s stakeholders from industry, academia and civil society. It was a perfect opportunity to explain how they can get involved in the project and how they will benefit from the tools offered, such as training modules, a help desk, guidelines and the exchange of best practices, commented CECIMO.

“Innovative CSR and sustainability initiatives have always been widely implemented by European machine tool companies. With the DESIGN-MTS project, we will disseminate such business practices to our sector and value chain, and show our stakeholders how the European machine tool sector contributes to society, the economy and the environment,” said Filip Geerts, Director General of CECIMO.

The European project DESIGN-MTS was launched in July 2013 and is coordinated by Università Degli Studi di Macerata. The project aims at raising awareness on CSR in the European machine tool sector, enabling enterprises from the sector to have a strategic approach to CSR and sustainability, and supporting a coordinated management of a CSR platform. Its four focus areas are employability & skills, demographic change & active aging, workplace challenges, and environmental challenges.

Enrico Annacondia commented on the project: “Integrating a strategic approach to CSR into machine tool companies’ core business is critical for the competitiveness of the sector, especially given the potential multiplying impact on several sectors of its supply chain.”