The circular economy is increasingly recognised as a pathway to long-term economic resilience and prosperity.

However, its application to date has focused primarily on finite, technical materials, overlooking bio-based materials. This gap limits the ability of the circular economy to deliver system-wide impact.

This paper intends to shed new light on the application of the circular economy framework to bio-based materials.

It finds that better alignment of policy agendas on circular economy and bio-based materials could deliver wide-ranging socioeconomic and environmental benefits. Many countries could see this as a key opportunity in the development of bio-based sectors within global value chains. It could also help to distribute value more fairly across all actors involved.