Technology at Heart: Shaping the circular economy in France

Orgalim’s latest edition of Technology at Heart is out, featuring case studies and insights into how Europe’s technology industries are shaping the circular economy.

As Malte Lohan, Orgalim’s Director General, writes in the foreword to the report:

Over the past six years, 70% more virgin materials were extracted than the planet can replenish. It's not hard to grasp that this is unsustainable.

Shifting to a circular economy can change this. Instead of the old take-make-waste linear approach, where we extract raw materials from the earth, make products from them and eventually throw them away as waste, a circular approach closes the loop, so that materials are used but not used up, and nothing goes to waste.

The potential for a circular economy to deliver economic, social and environmental benefits is huge. The European Commission has said that applying circular economy principles across the EU economy could increase EU GDP by an additional 0.5% by 2030 and create some 700,000 new jobs. 

Current estimates that Europe is barely 13% circular underline that there is much to do, but also highlight the scale of the opportunity ahead.

And Europe's technology industries are at the heart of the action. Many companies have been working on optimising design, materials and resource efficiency, and on reducing waste for years. Digital technologies are increasingly part of that process, as they prove themselves to be fundamental enablers of circular ecosystems.

This edition of Technology at Heart focuses on France, which has anticipated – and sometimes overshot – a harmonised European approach to the circular economy by implementing a number of national level circular economy policies. It features case studies from four French companies making the circular economy happen already and identifies some of the key enablers and challenges they face, yielding insights and implications for European policymaking.

It is produced in collaboration with Orgalim’s members in France, the Federation of Mechanical Industries, FIM, and FIEEC, the Federation of Electrical, Electronic and Communications technology industries.

Read the full report here or download in PDF below.