Are you part of a circular (or sharing) economy? Do you want to learn more about this and the research behind these concepts?

I went to an interesting afternoon hosted by the Hightech Zentrum Aargau and the Circular Hub (in Brugg) on the Circular Economy and Plastics on Tuesday afternoon and learned a lot. Two highlights were hearing a client speak about his companies and a professor give a big picture view of how complicated the subject of a circular economy (and just with plastics) is.

First, here are some quick definitions:

The Ellen MacArthur Foundation describes the circular economy as an ‘industrial system that is restorative or regenerative by intention and design’ (Ellen MacArthur Foundation, 2013) while the European Action Plan states that circular economy is an economy ‘where the value of products, materials and resources is maintained in the economy for as long as possible, and the generation of waste minimized’ (EC, 2015). While many definitions of CE exist (Kirchherr et al., 2017; CIRAIG, 2015), at the core of most of them lie “value retention processes”, i.e. mechanisms to retain value in our economy through reuse, repair, refurbishment, remanufacturing, redistribution and recycling (Nasr et al., 2018). 

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2665972719300054 

(credit for this graphic is from the website above)

Examples:

·       Circular fashion (MUD Jeans)

·       Deposit return schemes (plastic milk bottles, deposits on glass or cans)

·       Household products using recycled materials (Royal Auping, NE)

·       Zero waste dining (Too good to go)

·       Sugar production (British Sugar, Norfolk, GB)

https://newsroom.tomra.com/5-examples-circular-economy/

What I learned is that in all complex systems there are still a lot of questions to be answered regarding reuse, reduce, recycle and FIX it, not throw it away.

The first is, how can we make goods (and services) equal their real worth, and not just have che3ap throw-away products?

This past weekend I was at an Italian Market and was saddened by the reaction when we refused to buy a product made in China. The man selling the (rather cute) dress said, “Very cheap, only 20€”. My husband asked, “Where was it made?” The salesman ignored the question and referred to the nice 100% cotton material.  Then my husband found the tag inside: made in PRC. Well that stank of sweat chops and concentration camps to us, so we moved on and the man was really angry. Our Italian couldn’t explain that we would rather have locally made (Italian) goods that were not made by slave labor, and possibly cotton that had used a LOT of pesticide to make.  But how can we be sure that even the “made in Italy” is real?  This is a complex issue and only a small tip of a very large iceberg.

What I remember one presenter, Dr. Melanie Haupt of the ETH, ZH, saying is that we should drastically reduce the consumption of our meat intake, fly less (or not at all), get rid of our personal cars (and share/take public transport) and BYOB (no more pet bottles- bring your own bottle). Ouch. She said these are good first steps and I am considering them, seriously. How about you?

This needs immediate consideration from us all.

Thinking with you and looking forward to conversations on this,

Patricia Jehle                             patricia.jehle@jehle-coaching.com