Circular Economy in China: Moving from Rhetoric to Implementation

This report has been prepared in support of the work commissioned by China’s National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) to establish an indicator system that helps monitor progress towards the objectives of the circular economy (CE). For the purposes of this paper I adopt the working definition of CE referenced on NDRC’s Cleaner Production site: “CE may be interlinked manufacturing and service businesses seeking the enhancement of economy and environmental performance through collaboration in managing environmental and resource issues. The theme of the CE concept is the exchange of materials where one facility’s waste, including energy, water, materials- as well as information- is another facility’s input. By working together, the community of businesses seeks a collective benefit that is larger than the sum of the individual benefits each enterprise, industry and community would realize if it intended to optimize its performance on an individual basis (i.e. industrial symbiosis). ” (NDRC 2006) CE in many ways resonates with the concept of industrial metabolism, rooted in