Welcome to the Resources Centre of Excellence Circular Platform. This platform seeks to catalyse a circular economy in Queensland through the creation of a network of circular actors, empowered by circular economy education, insights, and funding.
What is the Circular Economy?
A new economic model for meeting human needs and fairly distributing resources while restoring nature’s functions and regenerating the natural capital on which we depend.
The circular economy is a bigger concept than simply switching one material for another or recycling better – it’s about creating interconnected solutions to meet interconnected challenges such as climate change, biodiversity loss, waste, and pollution.
The circular economy is guided by three principles:
Eliminate waste and pollution
Circulate products and materials in use at their highest value for as long as possible
Regenerate natural and social systems
With three guiding principles and five supporting business models, the circular economy provides a tangible tool kit to achieve impact across social, economic and environmental realms.
Why are we going circular?
The World Economic Forum states that depletion of natural capital and biodiversity risks rank among the top global risks.
Australian businesses, communities and government stakeholders are fast catching on to the opportunity of a circular economy. Where our current economic model economy leaks value from the system in the form of wasted resources, the circular economy designs waste out of the system so value can be re-circulated. In April 2021 PwC released a report valuing the circular economy at 2 trillion dollars over the next 20 years and highlighted that moving towards a circular economy could abate 165 million tonnes of carbon pollution each year in Australia, an outcome closely aligned to the Paris Agreement.
As a network and capacity builder in the Greater Whitsunday region, we are using our influence to increase the speed of uptake of circularity in the region.
Join us!
