Sustainaboost proudly introduce you to world friend and green warrior Tobias Jansson. He is dedicated to work and to inspire, to make Earth a better place, more sustainable through adapting a Circular Economy. For some of you, perhaps the concept of Circular Economy is new. Here is a little bit of explanation about the general ideas. Enjoy!
Circular Economy is a win-win situation for business and environment.
Why do people have problems with waste and environmentally harmful emissions, while ants do not, despite living in advanced societies? As a matter of fact, the total biomass of ants on earth exceed that of humans, but they still do not cause any harm, like people do. Why is this? People do have a design problem. Nature doesn’t.
If we re-think and re-design products and business models and get it right from the beginning, we’re able to create a solution that is sustainable over the long term and works exactly as good as natural systems. It’s about using materials which can flow as nutrients in technical and biological closed, cradle to cradle loops, and the development of innovative business models that supports these material flows. Then we can save a lot of money and resources for the economy and the society as a whole. We can create business benefits while using resources more wisely.
The concept, which is called Circular Economy, is a new, positive and solutions-oriented way of dealing with our resource challenges. The idea is that we need to turn today’s linear economy, which implies taking out resources, making products, consuming and finally disposing them, into an economy that works according to circular principles.
Here´s an example of a Cradle to Cradle-certified product. The park bench, NeoRomántico Liviano 100% aluminio, on Barceloneta Plaza from the Barcelona based company Santa & Cole. They produce urban furnitures and lampposts etc… Mainly for the markets of the Iberian peninsula, France and Latin America. Please check out the movie clip on the link below. In this case aluminum works as the “technical nutrient”.
http://www.santacole.com/en/catalogo/bancos/neoromantico-liviano-aluminio/
Right now there’s a lot of things going on in this field, i e thanks to The Ellen MacArthur Foundation, founded by sailing-around-the-world-recordist Ellen MacArthur in 2010. The foundation asked management firm McKinsey & Company to do research in what economic value a transition to a circular economy might bring about. The answer McKinsey came up with in the report “Towards The Circular Economy vol 1” (2012) was USD630 billion per annum, looking only at a subset of EU manufacturing sectors. The Ellen MacArthur foundation has also launched The Circular Economy 100, a business coaching initiative in which the foundation works with companies such as Coca-Cola, Ikea, Marks & Spencer and Ricoh to accelerate their transition to circular business models.
http://www.ellenmacarthurfoundation.org/
http://www.ellenmacarthurfoundation.org/business/reports
Tobias Jansson, a writer and lecturer who co-founded Scandinavia´s leading sustainable lifestyle magazine Camino in 2006 is now one of the front figures in Sweden trying to spread the word about the Circular Economy concept. On his blog CircularEconomy.se and in an upcoming book he writes about entrepreneurs and visionaries working to form a circular future. With departure in his interviews he gives lectures on Circular Economy and also holds workshops where participants are given the challenge to transform business cases with linear business models into circular ones. The lectures and workshops are available in Swedish and English, and right now Tobias Jansson is looking for opportunities to speak more internationally, not just in Europe, but anywhere an interested audience awaits him. Main target is business developers, science parks, educations in business, technology and design, as well as municipalities.
Tobias is always traveling by the best alternative of transports. If train is not an option to his destination, sometimes you can see him like this. Happy behind the steering wheel of an electric car. 😀
This is what a lecture could look like.
On the picture below Tobias explains the difference between traditional sustainability work, when you try to minimize damage, less emissions, less impact etc… and the circular point of view, that says: “Being less bad is no good”. Cradle to cradle is about starting from zero emission and then being 100% good, or more. If you´re going in the opposite direction instead of the way towards your goal, you need to turn around to get to your goal. You are not going to get there simply by breaking and slowing down you speed.
Here are some pictures from a workshop in Circular Business Models with Business Region Gothenburg.
If you want to book lectures or workshops with very inspiring green warrior Tobias Jansson, you can write him an e-mail in English, Swedish or Spanish. Would you like to have a 15% discount on his price? Your discount key is: Sustainaboost! Tell him that you read about him here! 😉
Contact and connect with Tobias Jansson on: tobias@circulareconomy.se
His blog and webpage: http://circulareconomy.se/
Follow Tobias on Twitter: https://twitter.com/tojler
Workshop: http://circulareconomy.se/cirkulara-affarsmodeller-hos-business-region-goteborg/
I want to say thank you Tobias for all inspiration and great things you are doing! I wish you best of luck with your future work, the book, the blog, lectures and workshops! Also the best of luck to all other green warriors of this beautiful planet. Together, we will make it better! Over and out… Thank you! 😀
Sustainaboost 