Upstream what? Solutions to plastic pollution

If you came home to find that your apartment was flooding, would you immediately start mopping up the water?

Probably not! That would be a futile effort without first finding out what is causing the flooding and stopping it. This is the essence of tackling the root cause of a problem — moving upstream.

In a circular economy, upstream innovation is about tracing a problem back to its root cause and tackling it there. Why deal with a pile of waste when we can prevent it from being created in the first place? Good for the environment, good for the economy: shifting just 20% of plastic packaging from single-use to reuse is an upstream innovation opportunity worth ~USD 10 billion.

In this episode, we'll explore worldwide cutting-edge upstream innovation examples to tackle plastic pollution. We will hear from Jessica Vieira from Apeel, who disrupts food systems by extending the life of fruit and vegetables without any single-use plastic. Also joining us is Dieuwertje Nelissen from Enviu, who will share their reuse projects and how they are tackling plastic pollution from Indonesia to The Netherlands.

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This podcast is based on a recent episode of the Circular Economy Show, watch the full episode following this link.

Explore our Upstream Innovation Guide.

Find more episodes of The Circular Economy Show here. 

More about our work on the Ellen MacArthur Foundation website.