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This collection features a selection of inspiring examples of the circular economy, compiled in the context of the Switch to Circular Economy Value Chains programme (SWITCH).

Launched in 2020, SWITCH is a five-year initiative that assists EU multinational companies and their suppliers from developing countries to switch to more circular economy approaches and practices in three selected value chains: [Plastic Packaging](https://knowledge-hub.circle-lab.com/switchtocircular/search?collections=832%3D0&framework_elements__5=111), [Textile & Garments](https://knowledge-hub.circle-lab.com/switchtocircular/search?collections=832%3D0&framework_elements__5=99), and ICT and Electronics.

The overall objective of SWITCH is to support the “transformation towards a circular economy”, and to contribute to sustainable growth, low carbon and climate resilient development, decent jobs creation, and a safer, healthier and pollution-free environment.

SWITCH is co-funded by the European Union and the Government of Finland, and implemented by UNIDO, in collaboration with Chatham House, Circle Economy, and the European Investment Bank.
Learn more at www.switchtocircular.eu

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Switch to Circular Economy Value Chains

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Business case

Impact on the ease of innovation, and facilitating uptake of innovations

Innovation

Minimise waste through diversion: Instead of sending waste to landfill, it is redirected into other industrial processes for handling, treatment, recycling, recovery, or reuse in various forms. 

Minimise waste through design: At the outset of a process of project, plan and design such that there is zero waste or minimal waste during production, use, and at end of life. 

Minimise Waste (SDG12)

Producing textile and leather products and processing them into apparel and accessories

Fashion and Textiles

Producing and gathering crop and animal products from land and water through farming, hunting, and fishing

Agriculture

Using bio-based materials such as bioplastics, mushroom-based materials, etc.

Alternative bio-based materials and inputs

Using <a href="https://echa.europa.eu/information-on-chemicals" target="_blank">materials that are not toxic or hazardous</a>.

Non-toxic materials and inputs

Transforming waste products, materials for reuse within other industries

Open loop upcycling

VISION:
Raw materials are renewable, recyclable and safe, kept in continual circulation.

DETAIL:
Imagine a time when…the raw materials that are used to make things are sourced from existing products and regenerative agriculture, via carbon negative and climate neutral processes. Biodegradable raw materials are used for products with biodegradable end routes. Toxic chemicals have been washed out of the global materials pool, disposed of safely and replaced with beneficial alternatives. Virgin fibres made from fossil fuels have been banned, while secondary synthetic fibres, derived from what was already in the system, are kept in constant circulation as a resource. Circularity accounting methods, built on science-based metrics, help to manage a balanced system of resources, across all industries, and in line with the planet’s environmental limits.

Raw Materials and Planetary Boundaries

VISION:
Products and services are designed for multiple use and material value retention, with maximum positive impact.

DETAIL: 
Imagine a time when…products flow via optimal collection and distribution streams into reusable and repairable product platforms. Reuse and access models are dominant, and products are designed for multiple recirculation before biodegrading (if designed to do so), or being broken down into reusable raw materials for production. People only consume what they need. Production and consumption wastes have been fully eliminated and multifunctional, season-less and timeless fashions are the norm, yet still fulfil our human need for expression and creativity without constraint. All business models, organisations, governments and citizens play a role in maintaining a healthy, functioning circular ecosystem.

Products and Services

Impacts

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Industries

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The principles of a circular economy concern designing out waste, regenerating ecosystems and keeping items in use. Decoupling the economy from material flows—improving the rate of resource productivity faster than the economic growth rate—is also a consistent guide. By evolving with the growing number of applications of circular economy principles, and consolidating these strategies across thematic areas, Circle Economy’s Key Elements Framework (KE) renders the elements of the circular economy salient and serves as a basis to derive contextual strategies and interventions. 


The Framework consists of:
- Core Elements: Activities directly handling product or material flows; and uniquely,
- Enabling Elements: those that remove obstacles for core actors.


Key elements of the circular economy

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Circle Economy's framework of strategies and activities that define the circular economy

It is 2050.  Full systems change has taken place. This wouldn’t have been possible without the immediate action and radical steps taken from 2020 onwards. Many targets had to be identified in the early 2020s and achieved by 2030 to ensure that the 2050 goal happened in full. A sense of urgency, turbo stakeholder collaboration, supportive government regulation and clear, data driven targets enabled the mindsets and systems change needed to transform to a fully circular textiles ecosystem.

A circular economics model underpins what we have created. It reflects and supports a living organism made up of makers, users and restorers, interacting across vibrant and interconnected networks. Checks and balances, alongside transparency and accountability, ensure a healthy system. Financial, environmental, and social metrics have the purpose of serving communities and the planet. There is shared ownership of profit and loss – across all three metrics – throughout the value chain.

This is what we’ve achieved over the last 30 years:

WCTD Themes

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Based on the work of [Bocken et al. (2016)](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/309699661_Product_design_and_business_model_strategies_for_a_circular_economy), the Four Flows Framework serves as a simple framework for managing resource flows in a circular economy by using less (Narrow), using for longer (Slow), using again (Cycle), and using clean, regenerative materials and energy (Regenerate).

These different principles of circular economy can be applied to our socioeconomic metabolism: we can design stocks like buildings, infrastructure, machinery, and vehicles to be rich resource mines for the future, and design manufactured goods and consumables to be cycled and made regenerative. Furthermore, the focus must also centre on getting more value out of fewer materials. Achieving the aims of a circular economy—minimising material use, regenerating the Earth, and preventing material losses—can be done through these four key strategies mentioned above.

Source: Circle Economy. (2023). *[The circularity gap report 2023](https://www.circularity-gap.world/2023)* (p.22). Amsterdam: Circle Economy. 

Four Flows Framework

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                 Welcome to H&M GroupOur StoriesOrange Fiber
In 2015, the Italian company Orange Fiber won the Global Change Award, the annual award initiated by H&M Foundation. This spring, their innovation, a luxe fabric made out of citrus juice by-products, is included in one of H&M’s most anticipated collections: Conscious Exclusive. Here, co-founder Enrica Arena shares the story behind the company.
26 March, 2019
Orange Fiber is made from citrus juice by-products, repurposing them to create silk-like cellulose fabric. Having won H&M Foundation’s Global Change Award in 2015, the founders are now more than ready to scale up production. This year, the fabric is one of many innovative and sustainable materials used in H&M’s annual Conscious Exclusive collection. But how do you come up with the idea of making a luxurious fabric out of waste? We had a chat with Enrica Arena, one of the founders of Orange Fiber.


Can you describe Orange Fiber and its history?
Orange Fiber is an Italian company that has patented and manufactures sustainable fabrics for fashion from citrus juice by-products. Following a collaboration with Politecnico di Milano University, it has been developed with an innovative process that allows turning virtually more than 700,000 tonnes of by-product that the citrus processing industry produces every year in Italy into a high-quality fabric that can respond to the need for sustainability and innovation of fashion brands. The citrus peel would otherwise have to be disposed of, with costs for both the processing industry and the environment. We patented the process in Italy in 2013, and extended to an International Patent Cooperation Treaty the following year.
We presented the first prototypes of fabric from citrus juice by-product in 2014, at the Expo Gate of Milan during Vogue Fashion’s Night Out. The trademark was registered, and the textile market tested by identifying strategic partners in the supply chain that is developing today in Italy and abroad, involving the excellence of the industry. The first pilot plant for the extraction of pulp from citrus was opened in December 2015 in Sicily. 
Then, on Earth Day in 2017, the very first fashion collection made with the exclusive Orange Fiber fabric was launched by Salvatore Ferragamo — one of Italy’s top fashion houses and a world leader in the luxury industry. The collaboration represents the shared ethical values underlying the project, shaping the fabric and showcasing its potential for elegant and sustainable applications. 
Sustainability and innovation, combined with the Made in Italy sign of quality, distinguish the product and make the company a reference for fashion players that cares about both environmental protection and exclusivity.


What has winning Global Change Award meant to you? 
In 2015, Orange Fiber was selected among more than 2,700 projects from 112 different countries and awarded it with a grant of €150,000 and a year of innovation accelerating, provided by the H&M Foundation in collaboration with Accenture and the KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm. Having the availability of the grant, together with the specialized support received by Accenture and having access to H&M Foundation network with the players in the fashion industry and the manufacturing industry, gave us the chance to achieve great progress in the development of our project, laying a solid foundation for the future of our company.


What was the accelerator year like, how did that impact you? 
It was amazing! Through the Innovation Accelerator, we have been supported over the course of a year to help analyse and develop our product while participating in a series of activities and international events. Our first activity was an intense boot camp week in Stockholm at KTH Campus in February. The aim of the boot camp was to outline the stages of the development of our innovation from the initial stage through to the final goal. During this period, all the Global Change Award winners and the technological readiness of our idea was challenged by KTH Innovation through practical workshops which taught us how to pitch our product, IPR protection and innovation development. This was followed by a study week in Shanghai in April, that offered us exclusive industry insight, opportunities to network and deep knowledge of circularity and fashion’s value chain. During this period, we were then coached via virtual and classroom training sessions led by experts from Accenture Strategy to help us tweak and fine-tune our business models. We have learnt a huge amount about the impact of sustainable processes throughout the value chain and we have had the unique chance to further connect the dots in the fashion industry and start building a network with key people within fashion production, sales, materials, innovation and sustainability.


What has been your focus since winning the award?
Since then, our focus has been to grow up, as a company and as professionals — improving our project and increasing our commitment to a greener fashion industry. On a practical level, we understood what was needed for the company to grow out of the “startup zone”, and what the international fashion industry look like. We focused on improving the production process, how to make it scalable and increase our impact and also how to make our product appealing for brands. Last but not least, we are looking for investor and partners at a global scale to make our dream of a greener fashion industry a reality as soon as possible.


Can you describe some positive breakthrough moments since winning GCA?
Thanks to the Global Change Award we significantly moved forward with our R&D, implementing our team and deploying our first-ever pilot production of more than 10,000 meters of fabric. This was pre-booked by the famous fashion brand Salvatore Ferragamo who has used it to create the first-ever collection of clothes made out of citrus, the Ferragamo Orange Fiber Collection. After the launch, during the Green Carpet Fashion Awards Italia in 2017, the Florentine fashion house created an exclusive evening dress, a handbag model from the Museo Salvatore Ferragamo collection and a pair of “F” wedge sandals in Orange Fiber fabrics, worn by top model Karolina Kurkova. And during the Global Change Award ceremony in 2018, the Taiwanese actress, model and sustainability influencer Chiling Lin wore a custom-made Orange Fiber gown by H&M. Actually, an exclusive Salvatore Ferragamo ensemble crafted with our sustainable fabrics from citrus juice by-products is among the 300 fascinating and unsettling objects showcased at the V&A Museum of London for the Fashioned from Nature exhibition, the first UK exhibition to explore the complex relationship between fashion and nature from 1600 to the present day.


What’s the biggest challenge for Orange Fiber? 
Our biggest challenges concern the industrial scale up and the optimisation of the costs of production. Practically, on one hand we are working on the process and on the synergies with citrus squeezers and their processes, and on the other hand we are working with industrial players in the cellulosic industry for fabrics to adjust to their standard of productions, while keeping in mind the brand’s requests and preferences that we discovered with our first production and testing our samples on the market with different players.
Also, this process requires time and investment, so we need to attract investors who believe in and support innovation in sustainable fashion.


What’s today’s status of your business?
Today, we are working hard to move forward in the R&D process to a point where we can scale up the technology and restart the production, with a long-term goal of optimising the costs of production. This is crucial to develop new potential collaborations with fashion brands who share our values. Eventually, we want to replicate the technology in Italy and abroad. We have a granted IP in the US, we’re entering the national phases in selected EU countries and it’s pending in India, Brazil and Mexico. 


What do you hope for, looking ahead? 
For the future, we hope to establish ourselves as the first Italian mover in the segment of sustainable fabrics through a “green” production of cellulosic fabrics from renewable sources, and to create a highly recognisable textile brand for its commitment toward environmental protection and transparency. Further, we want to expand our production outside of Europe in order to increase our impact and minimise our logistics, keeping in mind our sustainability goal.


    

 Tessuti di alta qualità ma creati a partire dagli scarti della filiera agrumicola: un modo per valorizzare contemporaneamente il Made in Italy e la sostenibilità. Questa è stata l’intuizione di Adriana Santanocito, specializzata in fibre tessili innovative e founder, insieme a Enrica Arena, di Orange Fiber, un’azienda nata nel 2014 – immaginata a Milano, ma realizzata a Catania – che si occupa della produzione di fibre e tessuti a partire dagli scarti degli agrumi. “L’idea è stata quella di utilizzare un prodotto simbolo della Sicilia da cui entrambe veniamo”, ci racconta Arena, che abbiamo intervistato per conoscere meglio questa realtà innovativa, “unirlo a quanto stavamo studiando a Milano per creare qualcosa che potesse portare innovazione e raccontare una storia diversa della nostra terra.” 
Orange Fiber: dalle arance ai capi di Ferragamo
Orange Fiber
Ogni anno, in Italia, la filiera degli agrumi produce una quantità compresa tra 700.000 e 1 milione di tonnellate di scarti, che le aziende si trovano a dover smaltire con un costo economico e ambientale piuttosto alto. “Quel che rimane dopo la spremitura è circa il 60% del peso originario: tolti gli oli essenziali e la polpa degli agrumi, resta tutto ciò che non è commestibile e non ha utilità.” Orange Fiber, invece, propone un’alternativa, partendo da questo sottoprodotto per dargli nuova vita: non soltanto un’azione di riciclo, ma di quello che tecnicamente viene chiamato “upcycling”, ovvero un processo di riuso e conversione migliorativi a partire da materie di scarto. 
Lo sviluppo di Orange Fiber ha preso avvio dal progetto di tesi di Santanocito e, in seguito, dalla collaborazione con il laboratorio di Chimica dei Materiali del Politecnico di Milano, grazie al quale è stato possibile brevettare un processo che consente di sfruttare le potenzialità del “pastazzo” per l’estrazione della cellulosa di agrumi, da cui realizzare un filato che può essere tessuto, tinto e confezionato. Enrica Arena ci spiega che, attualmente, l’azienda assorbe una parte del sottoprodotto di alcune realtà che si occupano della spremitura degli agrumi in Sicilia e fornisce ai brand e alle case di moda italiane un prodotto innovativo, sostenibile “e che ha in sé dei valori positivi stimolando il ricorso all’economia circolare. Di fatto, non andiamo a far crescere della materia prima apposta, ma utilizziamo quella già a disposizione senza dover destinare ulteriore risorse ad essa.”
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In pochi anni di attività, i tessuti di Orange Fiber sono già finiti in passerella e nei negozi. Nel 2017, infatti, è stata presentata la Ferragamo Orange Fiber Collection, una intera collezione realizzata con i tessuti realizzati con gli agrumi intrecciati insieme ad altre fibre a firma della storica casa di moda fiorentina. Nel 2019, invece, un top realizzato con Orange Fiber è stato inserito nella Conscious Exclusive di H&M, una collezione speciale del brand svedese interamente dedicata ai materiali sostenibili e innovativi.
Come nascono i tessuti di Orange Fiber
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La lavorazione del sottoprodotto agrumicolo prevede diverse fasi: “dalle aziende che si occupano della spremitura di arance e di limoni prendiamo lo scarto e lo lavoriamo nel nostro impianto in Sicilia, dove viene trasformato in cellulosa per il tessile. Grazie alla partnership con altri produttori, questo materiale prende la forma del fiocco, come accade per il cotone, oppure del filato e, insieme ad alcune aziende del comasco, viene creato il tessuto.”
La fondatrice ci spiega che la ricerca è stata atta a sviluppare un prodotto che, dal punto di vista della consistenza, ricordasse la seta: “è impalpabile, lievemente lucida, perché volevamo che si avvicinasse al mondo dell’alta qualità e del lusso.” Ma sono le aziende che, partendo dal tessuto che ha colore neutro, poi sviluppano un’idea creativa e una stampa e confezionano il capo finito. 
“Dal canto nostro”, continua Enrica Arena, “possiamo a partire dalla stessa materia prima sviluppare anche tessuti più vicini al mondo della camiceria, facendo dei mix con il cotone, prediligendo quello biologico, oppure a quello delle textures elasticizzate.” Orange Fiber è versatile e, di fatto, va ad offrire un’alternativa sostenibile ed ecologica ad un’industria, quella della moda, che ha un drammatico impatto ambientale, in particolare per via delle emissioni di gas serra e del consumo idrico legato alla produzione.
Un crowdfunding per aumentare velocità e produttività
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L’obiettivo per il futuro è quello di aumentare la produttività. “Già prima dell’emergenza per il Covid-19, era emersa l’importanza del tema della sostenibilità e quanto questa orientasse le scelte delle persone. Le aziende sono più attente a includere prodotti di questo tipo nelle loro strategie di approvvigionamento.” È cambiato, in questi anni, anche il modo in cui Orange Fiber viene visto sul territorio siciliano: “all’inizio eravamo delle visionarie, e le prime aziende a cui si proponevamo erano perplesse”, ricorda la fondatrice, “adesso che abbiamo avuto modo di dimostrare le potenzialità e l’utilità del prodotto c’è sempre maggiore disponibilità, apertura e curiosità.”
Nel 2019, l’azienda ha lanciato una campagna di equity crowdfunding che ha permesso di raccogliere 650.000 € per aumentare la capacità di produttiva. “Questo è il tema su cui stavamo lavorando quando è subentrata la crisi del Coronavirus, che ha bloccato le attività di produzione in piena campagna agrumaria. Speriamo di riprendere presto, e l’obiettivo è produrre, entro il 2021, 60 tonnellate all’anno di tessuto da agrumi e consolidare partnership lungo tutta la filiera, per renderlo disponibile il più velocemente possibile. I prodotti realizzati fino ad ora sono andati sold out molto in fretta, e ci dispiace che non ci sia abbastanza materiale per produrne di più e renderlo più accessibile”.  Immaginavate che fosse possibile produrre tessuti a partire dagli agrumi?
Leggi ancheRecup, l’associazione milanese che recupera frutta e verdura nei mercati 

Italy

Catania

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Orange Fiber is the Italian company that has patented and produces sustainable fabrics from citrus fruit by-products. 

Orange Fiber 

<p>Orange Fiber is the world’s first brand to produce sustainable fabrics from citrus juice by-products. The innovative process has been patented since 2014 in the main citrus juice producing countries all over the world.</p>

Orange Fiber: textiles from citrus waste

Orange Fiber is an Italian startup which has created textile fibres made of
100% citrus juice by-products. Over 700.000 tonnes of citrus peel waste is
produced in Italy every year, and by extracting cellulose fibres from the
product, it is possible to create to create a textile which is enriched with
vitamin C.

  

Read more at:

<http://www.orangefiber.it/en/how-to-turn-citrus-waste-into-a-sustainable-
fabric/>

<http://www.tomatomag.com/magazine/en/orange-fiber-the-fabric-from-the-citrus-
fruit-that-preserves-our-planet-and-our-skin/>





