Digital and circular innovation for Made in Italy wood supply chain: the FoRWARD research project

Made in Italy wood furniture industry is of fundamental importance in the EU economy and represents an excellence in terms of design and quality. In the wake of the ecological and digital transition, a change towards circularity and innovation is essential for SMEs to keep the competitiveness on the market and to contribute to reach the sustainability goals, in compliance with the European and national regulations for furniture products. On one hand, there is the need to find innovative ways to design the wood products’ life cycle without downgrading their properties at the end of life, defining new upcycling processes and solutions for waste and scraps, so to reduce the demand for virgin resources. On the other hand, due to the general fragmentation and technological obsolescence of the supply chain, there is an urgent need to promote training and technology transfer for SMEs, also facilitating profitable clustering and networking systems, so that innovative practices and traditional know-how can be combined in a life cycle-oriented and digitally enabled perspective of circularity. In this framework, this paper introduces the FoRWARD - Furniture Waste for circular design (MICS – NextGenEU, PE11, Spoke 4) research project, coordinated by Prof. Massimo Perriccioli and Prof. Marina Rigillo (Department of Architecture, University of Naples “Federico II”). The research aims at promoting the EU expected transition goals towards a circular design approach within the Made in Italy wood furniture industry. In particular, the research works for the implementation of circular supply chains within the wood furniture sector (SME, especially), focusing on those territories which are characterized by small and specialized enterprises, i.e. Southern Italy, with a strong know-how and legacy but struggling to achieve innovation. Therefore, the paper describes the activities fostered by the research towards three different tasks: defining advanced design and fabrication processes with wood waste-derived materials; facilitating knowledge sharing between innovators and local producers through the co-design of “tailor-made” tools, methods, and protocols; opening education and dissemination opportunities for companies, artisans and students.