For companies that are just starting out in the world of circularity, it can be unclear exactly how to get started and what the end goal is. Business leaders might find themselves talking in circles around the topic without making any progress, especially when talking to different stakeholder groups across their company or when looking at peers in their industries. Circularity can seem like an impossible end goal, but there are strategies to help you start and move toward a circular economy.
Understanding Traditional Linear Economy vs Circular Economy
To understand the different circular economy strategies, you first must understand the current model of production, consumption, and disposal. This traditional model has been termed the linear economy. The linear economy was born out of the industrial revolution and has driven tremendous global economic growth. However, this growth has been based on the unabated conversion of the world’s natural capital to material goods, which potentially implies long-term depletion of our natural resources.
On the other hand, the circular economy seeks to remedy this imbalance by keeping our natural capital in an extended – and ideally endless – loop. Manufactured goods are repaired, reprocessed, and recycled so that the base materials can be reused. Many people think of the classic “blue jeans” example when they think of circular economy. In this example a pair of jeans is made with sustainably sourced materials and an efficient design process. The consumer rents the jeans – meaning they will wear the jeans for as long as they like and when they are finished, they will return the jeans to be recycled. The cotton and materials used in the jeans will then be recycled and repurposed. Extending the product’s life creates jobs, and energy, resources, and waste are conserved by not manufacturing something new.
Circular Economy Business Strategies
While the blue jeans example seems like an ideal system of circularity, it’s just one strategy and may not be practical for every type of business. Employing one of the five circular economy business strategies listed below can present a host of new opportunities for your business.
1. Product-as-a-Service: This strategy focuses on leasing access to a solution instead of selling ownership of a product. Services can reduce cost volatility and create more active customer relationships.
2. Embedding Intelligence: A company with this circular business strategy builds technology into their materials or products to gather user data to improve the customer experience.
3. Product Life Extension: This strategy helps businesses extend the life of their products to make sure that they remain useful. Companies make sure a product is used for as long as possible and stay out of landfills by repairing, remanufacturing, or remarketing materials.
4. Smart Material Choices: A circular business strategy that considers a product’s end of life treatment when first choosing the materials. A company using this strategy for example would choose recycled, recyclable, or biodegradable materials when designing their product.
5. Closed Loop / Take Back: Businesses pursing this circular economy business strategy provide a service to collect old or used products and recovering the value in the materials by recycling or reusing them to make new products.
Circularity is Not a Perfect Circle
“Often when people think of moving to a circular business model, they picture one large, continuous circle for their material flows. However, in many cases, circular business models do not operate in perfect, closed loops. Most circular business models can be thought of as cascading flows of materials that stay in use but move across value chains and industries as the material quality or market needs change.” – Owen McKenna, Circular Economy Service Leader, Antea Group USA.
This concept may require a paradigm shift in thinking about how a business model can and should operate, as restructuring corporate strategy to fully embrace circularity could force a reconsideration of multiple aspects of a company’s business model including design, manufacturing, distribution, use and disposal at end of life. Companies must re-imagine how their supply chains could be organized to reduce risk. As sustainability and environmental stewardship receive more attention from shareholders, customers, and society-at-large, industry can adapt by leveraging circularity to capture greater value from materials and products and designing out waste.
Not a “One-Size-Fits-All” Approach
There is no one-size-fits-all approach to achieving circularity. It is an ongoing process unique to each company that will continue growing and improving overtime. Circularity does not happen overnight. Each company will have their own path to circularity that starts with making the decision to pursue a circular business strategy moving away from a traditional linear economy.
More About Antea Group: Antea Group is an international engineering and environmental consulting firm specializing in full-service solutions in the fields of environment, infrastructure, urban planning, and water. By combining strategic thinking and multidisciplinary perspectives with technical expertise and pragmatic action, we do more than effectively solve client challenges; we deliver sustainable results for a better future. We serve clients ranging from global energy companies and manufacturers to national governments and local municipalities. Learn more at https://us.anteagroup.com/.
OTTAWA – Canada’s unemployment rate held steady at 6.5 per cent last month as hiring remained weak across the economy.
Statistics Canada’s labour force survey on Friday said employment rose by a modest 15,000 jobs in October.
Business, building and support services saw the largest gain in employment.
Meanwhile, finance, insurance, real estate, rental and leasing experienced the largest decline.
Many economists see weakness in the job market continuing in the short term, before the Bank of Canada’s interest rate cuts spark a rebound in economic growth next year.
Despite ongoing softness in the labour market, however, strong wage growth has raged on in Canada. Average hourly wages in October grew 4.9 per cent from a year ago, reaching $35.76.
Friday’s report also shed some light on the financial health of households.
According to the agency, 28.8 per cent of Canadians aged 15 or older were living in a household that had difficulty meeting financial needs – like food and housing – in the previous four weeks.
That was down from 33.1 per cent in October 2023 and 35.5 per cent in October 2022, but still above the 20.4 per cent figure recorded in October 2020.
People living in a rented home were more likely to report difficulty meeting financial needs, with nearly four in 10 reporting that was the case.
That compares with just under a quarter of those living in an owned home by a household member.
Immigrants were also more likely to report facing financial strain last month, with about four out of 10 immigrants who landed in the last year doing so.
That compares with about three in 10 more established immigrants and one in four of people born in Canada.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.
The Canadian Institute for Health Information says health-care spending in Canada is projected to reach a new high in 2024.
The annual report released Thursday says total health spending is expected to hit $372 billion, or $9,054 per Canadian.
CIHI’s national analysis predicts expenditures will rise by 5.7 per cent in 2024, compared to 4.5 per cent in 2023 and 1.7 per cent in 2022.
This year’s health spending is estimated to represent 12.4 per cent of Canada’s gross domestic product. Excluding two years of the pandemic, it would be the highest ratio in the country’s history.
While it’s not unusual for health expenditures to outpace economic growth, the report says this could be the case for the next several years due to Canada’s growing population and its aging demographic.
Canada’s per capita spending on health care in 2022 was among the highest in the world, but still less than countries such as the United States and Sweden.
The report notes that the Canadian dental and pharmacare plans could push health-care spending even further as more people who previously couldn’t afford these services start using them.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 7, 2024.
Canadian Press health coverage receives support through a partnership with the Canadian Medical Association. CP is solely responsible for this content.
As Canadians wake up to news that Donald Trump will return to the White House, the president-elect’s protectionist stance is casting a spotlight on what effect his second term will have on Canada-U.S. economic ties.
Some Canadian business leaders have expressed worry over Trump’s promise to introduce a universal 10 per cent tariff on all American imports.
A Canadian Chamber of Commerce report released last month suggested those tariffs would shrink the Canadian economy, resulting in around $30 billion per year in economic costs.
More than 77 per cent of Canadian exports go to the U.S.
Canada’s manufacturing sector faces the biggest risk should Trump push forward on imposing broad tariffs, said Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters president and CEO Dennis Darby. He said the sector is the “most trade-exposed” within Canada.
“It’s in the U.S.’s best interest, it’s in our best interest, but most importantly for consumers across North America, that we’re able to trade goods, materials, ingredients, as we have under the trade agreements,” Darby said in an interview.
“It’s a more complex or complicated outcome than it would have been with the Democrats, but we’ve had to deal with this before and we’re going to do our best to deal with it again.”
American economists have also warned Trump’s plan could cause inflation and possibly a recession, which could have ripple effects in Canada.
It’s consumers who will ultimately feel the burden of any inflationary effect caused by broad tariffs, said Darby.
“A tariff tends to raise costs, and it ultimately raises prices, so that’s something that we have to be prepared for,” he said.
“It could tilt production mandates. A tariff makes goods more expensive, but on the same token, it also will make inputs for the U.S. more expensive.”
A report last month by TD economist Marc Ercolao said research shows a full-scale implementation of Trump’s tariff plan could lead to a near-five per cent reduction in Canadian export volumes to the U.S. by early-2027, relative to current baseline forecasts.
Retaliation by Canada would also increase costs for domestic producers, and push import volumes lower in the process.
“Slowing import activity mitigates some of the negative net trade impact on total GDP enough to avoid a technical recession, but still produces a period of extended stagnation through 2025 and 2026,” Ercolao said.
Since the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement came into effect in 2020, trade between Canada and the U.S. has surged by 46 per cent, according to the Toronto Region Board of Trade.
With that deal is up for review in 2026, Canadian Chamber of Commerce president and CEO Candace Laing said the Canadian government “must collaborate effectively with the Trump administration to preserve and strengthen our bilateral economic partnership.”
“With an impressive $3.6 billion in daily trade, Canada and the United States are each other’s closest international partners. The secure and efficient flow of goods and people across our border … remains essential for the economies of both countries,” she said in a statement.
“By resisting tariffs and trade barriers that will only raise prices and hurt consumers in both countries, Canada and the United States can strengthen resilient cross-border supply chains that enhance our shared economic security.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 6, 2024.
