Charity shops are the most basic form of circular economy-driven supply chains:people donate unwanted items rather than throwing them away so that they can be put to use by someone else. La Poubelle is a variation on the theme of charity shops: it's a goods bank tailored specifically to the needs of people facing hard times.
The Ressourcerie Namuroise in Belgium provides collection and processing services for bulky household waste, while also helping people with scant marketable skills to break into the labour market. In 2017, the cooperative established a partnership with Namur's waste management authority, which enabled municipalities to outsource the collection of bulky items with a view to their reuse.
Opravárna operates a web portal putting repair and service businesses in touch with people who need their services. It has also founded the Association Opravme Česko (Let's fix Czechia) in order to to bring together all relevant partners pursuing the same objectives - waste prevention and transition to a circular economy.
Oryzite is a method for incorporating rice husks as a filler in all types of thermoplastics. The company transforms the rice husks into resin, which can then be used to obtain the same volume of injection-moulded plastic using much fewer fossil-fuel-based polymers.
An increasing number of countries consider implementing a deposit return system for single-use beverage containers to address today’s challenges, i.e.:
meeting new waste recovery targets,
ending littering and
moving towards a circular economy.
TOMRA shares lessons learnt from its 45+ years’ experience of innovating and managing deposit return systems globally in a new white paper including:
outcomes of effective deposit return systems
4 key principles and 12 elements of high-performing deposit return systems
dozens of case studies on real-world implementation of deposit return policy.
The white paper seeks to contribute to an educated discussion on recycling best practice – including what can be learnt from the past and what the future may look like.
The Asia-Europe Environment Forum (ENVForum) Workshop Series on Circular Plastic Use: Innovate & Change to Close the Loop offers participants the opportunity to design and implement innovative solutions in the field of circular plastic use and waste management. This project planned for June 2021 is organized in association with INNOWO.
Commissioned by the Scientific and Technical Advisory Panel (STAP), which advises the Global Environment Facility (GEF), and co-authored by Circle Economy and Shifting Paradigms, this report uncovers the range of socio-economic and environmental co-benefits that circular mitigation interventions can bring to GEF countries of operation.
The report supports strategic advice by the STAP to the GEF and its implementing partners, and helps carve out a role for these bodies in accelerating the transition to a low-carbon circular economy. Its findings will be highly relevant to the development of future GEF projects and programmes across its different focal areas.