This report examines how materials enter the economy, whether they re-enter it and, if not, how they leave it - either as waste or emissions. 

Various sub-indicators support each of the headline indicators (Circular; Linear; Potentially circular, potentially linear, which is to say net additions of virgin materials to stocks, such as buildings, infrastructure and machinery, that can either be recycled or wasted at their end-of-life) to give a sense of where we are, where we’re heading and where targets are needed to drive action in the right direction. 

The report finds that of all materials entering the global economy in 2021, 6.9% were secondary materials - a decrease of 0.3 percentage points since 2018. Furthermore, of the total exiting the economy, only 11.2% was recycled.