Circular Sweden is a business network of ten progressive companies that, together with the Swedish Recycling Industry Association, want to accelerate the development of circular products and material flows. As part of this mission, we have selected four product and material streams with significant climate impact plastic, textile, construction products and electronics – with the aim is to identify challenges and measures to overcome these, as well as increase recycling and the use of recycled materials in these four categories.
For example, every year Sweden uses 1.3 million tons of plastic raw material, 141,100 tons of new textiles, 3.3 million tons of steel, 3 million tons of cement, and nearly 80,000 tons of electronic products.
Our focus within the network on large circular product- and material flows. The jointly agreed objective is to make Sweden a world leader in circular and material flows by 2030, as well as the driving force of this development internationally.
By 2040, the goal is a society without any major need for finite raw materials. This report shows how we within Circular Sweden work together for increased circularity and what goals we have set in our respective operations. With insight from our sustainability officers, we highlight examples of how the work has developed over time, what challenges we encounter and what conditions our companies depend on to continue developing more circular products, processes, services and business models.
At Circular Sweden we take the circular transition very seriously and strive to be forerunners in resource efficiency and climate care. However, achieving profi tability in circular business models also requires support from policymakers. These are our six most important policy proposals:
The 6 most important policy proposals:
- Enhancing design for longevity and recycling
- Reduced VAT & tax on reuse and repairs
- Minimum levels of recycled material in new products
- Strengthened systems for information exchange in the value chain
- Introducing freedom of choice so that companies can refine
their waste - Enhanced compliance oversight for product and waste legislation