Today's national statistical systems are mainly focused on indicators reflecting the linear economy model, but the situation is changing. At the European level, the 10 indicators for circular economy proposed by Eurostat are a first step towards this goal, but, according to ENEA's understanding, they are not yet able to cover all the themes and issues related to circular economy.

ENEA is directly involved in the following activities focusing on the assessment, proposal and selection of circular economy indicators:

1. ICESP - WG3 on circular economy indicators
2. SUN (Symbiosis Users Network) - WG4 on Certification, standards and indicators for industrial symbiosis
3. UNI CT 057 - WG3 on Circular economy indicators
4. ISO TC 323 - WG3 on Measuring circularity framework
5. Italian focus on circular economy indicators
6. Bellagio process.

1. ICESP's WG 3 is analyzing and mapping national, European and international indicators for circular economy coming from different stakeholders (public bodies, companies, associations, etc.).

2. Similarly, SUN's WG 4 is focusing on indicators for monitoring the Industrial Symbiosis application.

3. UNI and ISO activities are strictly related. At the moment the UNI CT 057 - WG3 is assessing about 100 documents from many different sources, all focused on circular economy indicators with a lot of different approaches and levels - macro, meso, micro - of assessment or activity sectors.

4. The ISO TC 323 work will last 3 years. Its final product will probably and hopefully be a standard on circular economy, applicable and recognized worldwide, also taking into account the circular economy indicators. The next ISO TC 323 (remote) plenary session is foreseen on 15-19 June 2020.

5. In 2018 the Italian Ministry of Environment, together with the Ministry of Economic Development, and with the scientific collaboration of ENEA, published a document (in IT) on Circular Economy and the efficient use of resources - Indicators for measuring circular economy and a first review of the existing indicators for circular economy and the indicators that can be calculated from existing data. New indicators were proposed that, at the moment, are not valuable since data is not available. The list is to be considered as not exhaustive. The aim of the work was to understand the scenario in order to select a short list of functional indicators focused on specific targets. They are to be updated once new indicators are proposed.

6. The Bellagio event 2020 - from Event to Process - titled “Monitoring progress in Europe’s Circular Economy: building upon the Bellagio Principles” is scheduled in Bellagio (IT) on 14-16 October. It is organised and promoted by the European Environment Agency (EEA) and the Italian Agency for the Environment Protection (ISPRA). It aims to consolidate key principles and areas for future work to improve the monitoring of circular economy. Within this framework, ENEA has been involved as a stakeholder and will participate in the preparatory seminars and in the final event itself. To read the full draft of the Bellagio declaration, still under processing, to be adopted in October, click here.