Circular or not circular. This is the problem

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Episode #3 of Perbacco! Newsletter can begin! ??

How to take care of our planet and change the colour of our future

In the living room of my house, Rocco stands proudly.

At the height of the pandemic, having eaten the fruit of an avocado, I stabbed its seed with three toothpicks and placed it in a jar of water. I wanted to see if it could be reborn, perhaps because at that time every sign of life and resilience seemed even more precious.

In three years Rocco grew to its current height of 136 cm. I called him Rocco because of his manifest overbearingness to grow, since among the meanings of the name there is also the Celtic one 'of high stature'. It has bright green leaves with yellow veins that speak of exotic climates (see cover image ??).

Over the years, I have changed my relationship with what we call waste. On closer inspection, they are not waste, but materials. Sometimes biological like the seed of a fruit, other times technical like the battery of a telephone.

It is precisely materials and the relationship we have with them that are one of the priorities outlined in the Circularity Gap Report 2023, the annual report just published by Circle Economy, an organisation working to foster and accelerate the transition to the circular economy. The most striking figure to come out of the report is that the global economy is now only 7.2% circular and getting worse year on year, due to increased extraction and use of materials. It was 9.1% in 2018, then 8.6% in 2020 and has now dropped to 7.2%.

What does this figure mean? That secondary materials that are recycled in the global economy only account for 7.2% of all material inputs in the economy. The problem is not simply due to the fact that we are not recycling more, but also to the increased extraction of virgin raw materials and the fact that we are using more and more materials in stocks such as roads, houses and durable goods.

But let's take a step back.

What does circular economy mean?

When I want to make this concept understood, I always resort to this simple illustration:

The linear economy is characterised by its 3 key steps: take - produce - dispose. It starts with raw materials, builds the product that is consumed and then disposed of. The global economy is still founded on this linear process, which in all steps manifests its inefficiency, not only for the economy, companies, and consumers, but also for the planet.

The recycling economy, on the other hand, is based on waste recovery through the conversion of waste into reusable material. It is a process that occurs at the end of a product's linear life cycle.

The circular economy is based on the idea that design should include reuse, repair and regeneration of both products and materials from the outset, precisely to avoid the creation of waste and pollution in the first place.

The health of our planet ??

Precisely because we have based our economy and our consumption habits on the linear economy model, we are living in an era of overshoot, i.e. of overexploitation of the planet and the overshooting of many indicators that track the health of our planet.

We have vastly overshot atmospheric CO2 concentration limits, overexploited the soil and altered the nitrogen and phosphorus cycles due to intensive agriculture, mismanaged wastewater, overused fossil fuels, released environmentally harmful substances, causing ocean acidification and the loss of many of the planet's unique species.

The only positive news is that the notorious ozone hole is gradually shrinking thanks to regulations adopted in recent decades that have banned the most harmful substances in the atmosphere.

How do we get out of this?

Fortunately, there is a way to undo the damage done: adopt the principles of the circular economy so as to reverse course on those indicators that are now largely in the red.

To do this, we should apply the key principles of the circular economy, namely: limit, slow down, regenerate, put back into circulation.

1. Narrow: use less

Concretely, this means, for example, reducing the use of materials and energy in construction, reducing the consumption of meat from intensive livestock farms and the purchase of fast-fashion clothing, moving with zero-emission or lower-impact vehicles.

2. Slow : use longer

Designing products and infrastructures to be more durable and repairable, so as to keep materials in use as long as possible and thus reduce the demand for new materials and the extraction of primary resources.

3. Regenerate: make clean

Phase out hazardous or toxic materials and processes, replacing them e.g. with regenerative agricultural practices (switching from synthetic to organic fertilisers) while maximising the share of biomass entering the circular economy streams.

4. Cycle: use again

Recycle and reuse materials to their maximum value, maximising the volume of secondary materials that re-enter the economy and minimising the need for new primary materials.

A global circular economy would allow us to satisfy the needs of all living people on Earth with only 70 per cent of the materials we now extract and use, bringing human activity back within the safe limits of the planet.

There is no shortage of recipes for immediate action. To adopt them we need the commitment and collaboration of everyone: governments, industry, we citizens and consumers who, with our choices, can decide what colour we want to give our future.

The red of emergency or the green of hope.

Rocco, by nature, has already clearly expressed his preference.??

Hints and notes

?? Defining which marketing ideas are best and prioritising them is not always so easy, but you can use these 3 methods to solve the problem. (SproutSocial)

?? Google has said in the past that it has avoided launching certain AI products because of the potential 'reputational damage' but the global success of Chat GTP is causing quite a few headaches for Google. (The Verge)

?? If ChatGPT is also worrying you who work in marketing, you can rest assured, it won't steal your job. As long as you do a job with qualities too human for a robot. (Forbes)

?? Shit can save the World! This is the slogan of Gastona, an Italian company that produces toilet paper from bamboo and is 100% carbon-neutral. Among the available subscriptions are the Stitica**i and the Regolarissimo, calculated according to your... intestinal regularity! ?? Brave creatives! (In Italian)

?? Rather than Shakira's sentimental and singing affairs, it is definitely more interesting to understand how the brands mentioned in her song did Real Time Marketing. (MarketingEspresso - in Italian)

?? 7 Creative Trends that will influence visual and creative communication in 2023. (Ninjamarketing - in Italian)

?? And to end on a lighter note

Among the many curiosities and peculiar choices made by Radiohead is that of having named their online merchandising store W.A.S.T.E.

The reason for this is twofold: a homage to the 1960s novel The Enchantment of Lot 49 by Thomas Pynchon, Tom Yorke's favourite author, where this W.A.S.TE. is cited as a private and untraceable means of communication by the government, but also a clear reference to the meaning of the English word waste. As if to say?: if you really want to buy our merchandising, go ahead and buy it, but know that for us it is completely unnecessary.??

?? About me

Hello ! I am Antonio Di Bacco, a business consultant who helps companies grow by adopting innovative and sustainable solutions over time, including for our planet.

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?????? An Italian version of the newsletter is available?here.