The METABUILD project was part of the European Union funded SWITCH-Asia Programme and has been implemented from March 2016 until February 2020. METABUILD specifically targeted the metal industry supplying to the building and construction sector across Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka. The project has proven that Resource Efficient Cleaner Production (RECP) not only entails ecological and social benefits by increasing the sustainability in metal industries, but also makes the case for economic benefits for small and medium enterprises (SMEs).
This lessons learnt report shares the key success factors and learnings generated from scaling up a successful approach to wider contexts. Touching on both the direct industry support component and the stakeholder engagement component of the project as well as project management insights, the report is designed to inform the future scaling of projects and action in RECP measures for SMEs. The goal of this report is to support other implementing organisations to successfully set up, coordinate and monitor comparable multi-country and multi-stakeholder projects. It provides essential lessons learnt on the practical challenges of such a project, as well as good practices on the overarching project design to maximize the benefit of multi-partner and multi-country RECP projects for donors, project teams and, most importantly, all different stakeholder groups involved.