Section 3.3: Changing business contexts and the imperative to act

Week 3 Content

Section 3.1: Business, the economy and sustainability

Section 3.2: Linear economy and the limits to linear consumption

Section 3.3: Changing business contexts and the imperative to act

3.3.1 Changing Demand Trends
3.3.2 Changing Supply Trends
3.3.3 Changing Values and Paradigms

Section 3.4: Closing the loop – towards a circular economy

Section 3.5: Circular economy in practice

Humanity has operated on the concept of unlimited economic growth for the past 360 years. This ideology of unlimited growth has led to the dominant belief that more production and consumption is always positive, regardless of environmental and social consequences.

Increasing signs of resource depletion, commodity prices, and volatility in the global economy, alongside a growing global understanding that the natural environment is not a limitless source of resources and sink for wastes, have prompted a rethink of this traditional paradigm.

This shift has prompted changes across our political, economic, market, and social systems and highlighted the need for a more resource efficient and sustainable economic model to be adopted.