The most efficient and lasting use of natural resources is good not only for the environment, but also for the economy. São Paulo hosts this international forum on the subject. One of the strategies to reduce the pressure for natural resources and the issue of greenhouse gas is the circular economy: instead of producing articles for single use that have seen garbage in the end, give priority to the articles that can be reused.
This week, San Paolo will be the World Center of Circular Economy Debates. Ibirapuera Park will host the international circular economy forum on Tuesday (13/05) and Wednesday, the first edition of the meeting in Latin America.
Experts see the potential for the circular economy in Brazil, with environmental, economic and social reflections, but warn the challenges that should be overcome.
Cheap earnings
In the linear economy, natural resources are extracted, which are transformed into products and, in the end, we discarded the garbage. In the circular economy, this flow is broken: the products are designed since the beginning of the production chain to maintain the resources extracted from nature in use by the company for as much as possible time and usefulness, through processes such as recycling, reuse, repair and examination of life.
A study by the Dom Cabral Foundation stresses that Brazil generates about 81 million tons of urban solid waste per year, of which 33.6% of is recyclable. But only from 2.4% to 8.3% of these waste is actually recycled, according to several surveys.
The result is an estimated economic loss of R $ 14 billion per year, as well as environmental impacts such as landfill overload and aggravation of pollution.
“There is a gigantic circularity potential, in particular in developing countries, including Brazil, because we still have a great culture of waste, both for people and for companies”, says Flávio De Miranda Ribeiro, ambassador of the circular movement initiative. “There is the potential in reducing the various types of waste.”
The country also has specific characteristics of its geography, climate and biodiversity that can be explored in this model, including the innovative forms of circular practices by biological activities and the knowledge of indigenous peoples and Quilomombola.
“Brazil has a gigantic wealth, both from the point of view of biological activities – active ingredients, substances – and of the same ancient knowledge,” says Ribeiro. “We have examples in the Amazon of the Pirarucu chain or even more traditional chains such as that of orange juice, sugar and alcohol. These are chains in which nothing is lost, everything is reused.”
In another practical example, the Brazilian agricultural research company (Embrapa) has developed a project to use Carnauba wax – a Brazilian raw material – to increase the conservation of fruits, reducing waste and preservation duration. “It is a biotechnology of a traditional Brazilian knowledge that is enjoying,” says Ribeiro.
A study by the Ministry of the Environment estimates that the circular economy has the potential to generate up to 7 million jobs in Brazil by 2030, in particular in the recycling, reuse and Remaniff sectors.
Companies begin to join, but the transition requires scale
Six brazilian industries out of ten adopts circular economic practices, according to a survey carried out by the National Confederation of Industry (CNI) which will be released at the World Circular Economy Forum.
The most frequent circular action is the recycling of the product, present in one third of the companies (34%). So the offer is the repair of items during use (32%) and the use of recycled or recovered resources in products (30%).
“Companies have already understood that also incorporating circular practices are a reason for competitiveness,” says David Bomtemppo, environmental superintendent and CNI sustainability. “If you recycle, use less energy, use less water, consequently the cost is lower, its price is lower and you are much more competitive. So this equation is already very well defined in the head of the businessman.”
However, experts warn that the model must advance beyond punctual actions. “I think this number fills us with optimism,” says Ribeiro, from the circular movement. “But we cannot be in a position of comfort. We have to challenge yourself, and then I am talking to every company, for each institution, to bring a continuous improvement, to go beyond the circular economy.”
“The main objective of the circular economy is that you have to think about prison as a whole”, explains Beatriz Martins Carneiro, coordinator of the Circular Economy Coalition for Latin America and the United Nations Caribbean. “Many people focus on the question of recycling. Of course, recycling is important and part of the circular economy chain, but you must have the priority are also in prison so as not to generate this residue.”
Routes for the transition
Izabella Teixeira, former environmental and articulator minister of international policies, states that, despite the great potential of Brazil and the ambition to develop this model, the opinion of the circularity is not consolidated in the country.
“Brazil deals with circularity at the end of the production chain, which is the problem of recycling, reuse, of the famous three RS,” says Teixeira. “And not a complete vision of the production chain, in which natural resources are during the production process, and you must initially provide efficiency and after sufficiency.”
In order for the model to consolidate and translate into social and economic gains, experts highlight the need for articulation between various actors – governments, companies and civil society – and build an institutional platform capable of reducing circular solutions. This passes through logistical infrastructures, tax incentives, updated regulatory paintings and coherent public policies.
“With a good public policy, we open the road so that the entrepreneur can operate with legal certainty and clear rules,” says Bomtempo di Cni. “In this way we rotate the economy, more work, more GDP, more income, more development from this new economy that you will work on the side of the efficiency of natural resources and the side reduction side.”
There were some signs in advance. Last year, the national government created the national circular economy strategy to support the implementation of processes that consider circularity from the conception of products, under the management of the Ministry of Development, Industry and Commerce.
Last Thursday, the national circular economy plan was also approved, which will act as a base to establish circularity policies in the next ten years, also from tax adjustments to mapping production chains.
“The federal government woke up with this reality,” says Ribeiro. “He has created not only the importance of the theme, but the opportunity we must use the circular economy as a vector of reindustrialization of the country and the redevelopment of various production activities”.
Source: Terra
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