For some organisations, there are areas of the business where there are higher levels of sustainability and the use of the Circular Economy than others and often this has seen a business undertake a remodelling of its business model (Pauli 2017). For other businesses, there is a model which has been built around the concept for the Circular Economy and Sustainability to directly address the pursuit of a competitive advantage, such as serving an underserved market or ensuring that its resources are reused and thus provide value for both the business and its stakeholders and an example of this can be seen in the case study of Natura Brazil (Elllen MacArthur Foundation 2017aa).
4.1.1 Natura Brazil
Natura Brazil is a large cosmetics company and is reliant upon the biodiversity provided by Brazil’s natural resources (Elllen MacArthur Foundation 2017b). Unfortunately, the demand for agricultural land has created social and environmental harm as large areas of forests are cleared and this has had a negative impact upon the levels of biodiversity; climate change and indigenous people who have been displaced from their lands (Elllen MacArthur Foundation 2017b). To address the risk of the loss of the access to natural resources for its products, Natura Brazil have undertaken a strategy which uses the knowledge held by local communities as regards the benefit of the natural resources as part of its cosmetics production processes and also demonstrates the value of these natural resources, such as trees, as being greater if left, rather than being destroyed (Elllen MacArthur Foundation 2017b). The economic benefits of this activity include employment for local communities and the protection of the natural resources which are fundamental to the sustainable success of Brazil Natura (Elllen MacArthur Foundation 2017b).
4.1.2 Renault
The case study of Renault is focused upon a particular aspect of its manufacturing processes which addresses the need to address the use of recycled plastic to both reduce the costs of this resource and to provide higher levels of supply chain resilience whilst also reducing the environmental impact of the production of plastic and the waste products from this (Ellen MacArthur Foundation 2017c). To address this issue, Renault collaborated with a number of stakeholders to develop a closed loop process to retain plastics within its manufacturing processes (Elllen MacArthur Foundation 2017c). This closed loop undertook a process of adapting existing systems, rather than developing a new one, and was therefore relatively straightforward to implement (Elllen MacArthur Foundation 2017c).
The different approaches undertaken by these selected organisations indicate some of the decision-making processes which are undertaken by an organisation in response to issues of sustainability which include resource security and the prevention of environmental degradation (George et al 2016; Bocken et al 2016). The application of the circular economy can therefore provide a means to increase the level of sustainability within a business activity, but this may undertake a business-centric approach by increasing the level of security within the supply chain (Jac
