Politechnika Rzeszowska im. Ignacego Łukasiewicza

The role of environmental labelling programs is large and steadily growing globally. Whereas the number of ecolabel schemes, until 2012 was 544 in the world [source: OECD, 2016], simultaneously the common formal educational tools and trained teachers in this field, were lacking. The absence of university courses covering distinctly in a complex way the systems of environmental labels and declarations is the problem in many regions. The current situation should be changed to benefit from new opportunities addressed by the Circular Economy Package (CEP) of the European Union (EU), a part of a transformation policy towards a new economic system i.e. circular economy. One of such transformation tools are systems of environmental labels and declarations considered as strategies on innovations supporting the business. The open availability of new educational tools and teacher capacity in environmental labelling should increase the awareness of consumers who create demand for ecolabelled goods and are the main determinant of ecolabels diffusion in the EU.