Activity | Project news First EUROqCHARM stakeholder webinar

22/11/2021

“Since EUROqCHARM is a Coordination and Support Action that provides a platform for discussion, interaction with stakeholders is extremely important,” said Bert van Bavel as he opened the first stakeholder event on November 9th. - a webinar, out of necessity, with 19 representatives of instrument manufacturers and suppliers, governmental and intergovernmental bodies, international organizations, environmental agencies, accredited labs, and industry. The webinar provided an outline of the project, a glimpse on the preliminary results and an interactive session using the tool Mentimeter.

screen shot of the webinar

By exploring the preliminary results, stakeholders could clearly see that the data derived from a systematic literature review combined with SWOT analyses (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) can answer a lot of research questions. Bavo De Witte, who works on analysis of plastic pollution in biota, illustrated this with questions such as “Is the gastro-intestinal tract a suitable analysis matrix for studying pollution in fish?”, and “What is the additional value of applying a density separation?” Stakeholders quickly came up with additional research questions. That input will be used during the continuation of the project, and additional input and ideas are always welcome. There was clearly also a lot of interest to participate in the EUROqCHARM process of comparing approaches, by means of interlaboratory studies. “All labs can register free, and we are talking with other initiatives to synchronize efforts. There will be a big announcement when we get started”, Bert van Bavel explained.

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Everyone (working on plastic detection) is aware of EUROqCHARM at the moment

Andreas Kerstan (Agilent Technologies)

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Bert Van Bavel (NIVA)

EUROqCHARM project coordinator