Hurdles on the way to the circular economy

The current economy is still predominantly linear in design. This means that resources are mined, processed, consumed and ultimately end up in landfills. In a truly sustainable economy, however, material cycles would have to be closed and completely new business models would have to be designed that decouple growth from resource consumption. Researchers from the Institute of Management and Strategy at the HSG, together with the University of Lausanne, have asked Swiss SMEs what reasons prevent them from switching to such business models.