In a recent article published on the International Journal of Information, Business and Management, Dr. Drakulevski and Dr. Boshkov argue that increasing resource efficiency through growth in circular economy can help address structural mismatch in European labor markets.
Circular economy through eco-design, waste prevention and increased reuse and recycling of products, provides that value of products, materials and resources is maintained in the economy for as long as possible.
A circular economy creates economic value with more labor and fewer resources, therefore growth in circular economy can potentially deliver economic benefits such as employment creation and lower structural unemployment by offering a good geographical spread of job opportunities.
Increasing resource efficiency through growth in circular economy can help address structural mismatch in European labor markets.
Higher unemployment regions can benefit from remanufacturing employment at or near to existing manufacturing industry. Growth in recycling, re-use, repair activities (and remanufacturing) also offer the potential to create jobs suitable for employees displaced from traditional manufacturing. Through expanding circular economy activity there’s a reasonable potential to reduce regional and/or occupational mismatch and a strong chance that net jobs can be created with sustained reductions in unemployment.
Circular economy through eco-design, waste prevention and increased reuse and recycling of products, provides that value of products, materials and resources is maintained in the economy for as long as possible.
The most used definition for circular economy is that “it is an alternative to a traditional linear economy (make, use, dispose) in which we keep resources in use for as long as possible, extracting the maximum value from them whilst in use, then recovering and reusing products and materials. Examples of circular business models include designing products to last longer, which can lead to greater reuse and greater ability to repair/refurbish and re-sell products to support growth in the remanufacturing industry; and allow for easy recovery of materials when a product is eventually recycled. Service models, which could include product maintenance and take back schemes as well as rent/lease and peer-to-peer sharing models, also hold much potential” (Beasley et al.,2014). Having in mind this definition, here are the reasons why a circular economy is important. As well as creating new opportunities for growth, a more circular economy will enhance to: •reduce the waste •drive greater resource productivity •deliver a more competitive national economy. •position the host country to better address emerging resource security/scarcity issues in the future. •help to reduce the environmental impacts of host production and consumption (in both – the host country and abroad).
Development of a circular economy involves a major industrial transformation. Past industrial transitions and the focus on labor productivity have often involved using less labor, creating high unemployment in some regions and countries or for some categories of workers. By contrast, the growth of the circular economy can involve using more labor and fewer resources to increase the efficiency of economic activity. Therefore, integrating the labor market impacts of a growing circular economy into the overall labor market is important as it also allows a distinction between net or additional job creation and gross jobs where vacancies are filled by people moving from existing posts. The report also discusses developing metrics that measure economic productivity relative to material inputs, rather than solely focusing on labor or energy, so that circular economy principles are more likely to become embedded in business thinking (Eurostat, 2018)
