Wad van Waarde

The project Wad van Waarde

In the north of the Netherlands you will find a unique area. Here salt and fresh water mix, the horizon fades and sometimes the sea is land. Here everything grows, swims, flies and lives. Here borders disappear.

In the Wadden area, designated as UNESCO World Heritage, everything comes together. And that offers opportunities. Here you will find a valuable nature reserve, breathtaking views and beautiful people. But here microplastics also flow into the sea, container ships transport their goods, biodiversity shrinks and the economy groans. The Wadden coast is the world in a nutshell or the canary in the coal mine.

We show how change is possible through integral collaboration, in which product designers play a crucial role. Our goal is to realize a plastic-free Wadden area, as an inspiring example for other (UNESCO) nature reserves, to show how it can be done!

A maker network for circular products

We map out what is valuable for nature, tourism, agriculture, economy or education and connect all that value in two ways:

We build an integral value chain. A local, sustainable maker network of (young) farmers, designers, students, entrepreneurs and makers.
We design and make alternatives for plastic products. Local, circular products that can replace everything made of plastic. This way, plastic will never flow into the sea again.

The approach

With a solid network, anchored in that northern clay, Wad van Waarde is working on the future of this special piece of World Heritage. If it were up to Wad van Waarde, the future of the Wadden area would be (micro)plastic-free.

We started a multi-year program in which we develop sustainable multi-use products with local value chains that we make from local, renewable and biodegradable materials. Join our value chains and help create a future-proof, plastic-free Wadden area.

Value chain
We do this by mapping everything that is of value in the Wadden area and connecting it to each other. With our network full of down-to-earth northerners, we develop alternatives for plastic products as an example with which we tackle the source of pollution and secure the future of the Wadden area. With this approach, we achieve concrete results and are therefore valuable for the future of our nature, manufacturing industry, agriculture, economy, education and tourism.