The Role of the Paper Packaging Industry in the Circular Economy: The Causal Relationship Analysis via Neutrosophic Cognitive Maps

Introduction

Operations management studies have taken an important role in the sustainability field of study since the early 2000s. Especially as a new research topic, “circular economy” (CE) has made effective contributions, and it is clearly stated in the business reports that the CE movement has trillions of dollars’ economic potential (Ellen MacArthur Foundation, 2021; European Union, 2021; McKinsey Quarterly, 2017; Accenture, 2017). In addition to this economic attractiveness, the environmental potential of the movement is also accelerated the transition to the CE (Ellen MacArthur Foundation, 2017). This concept has gained worldwide popularity, has had a significant impact on business and politics. For example, many Fortune 500 multinational companies, including famous brands such as HP, H&M, Philips, Google, Unilever, Danone, and Nike, have adopted the circular economy (Agrawal et al., 2019).

The CE aims to create better business models for industry and environmental consequences for society. The basic idea is here to achieve a CE that reproduces and restores traditional business models, materials, products, and other resources by circulating them through a system (Ellen MacArthur Foundation, 2017). In this context, there are three operational strategies: (i) Reverse flow is the establishment of large-scale industrial systems capable of returning all materials, components and products to the system. Activities such as repair, remanufacturing, renovation and recycling are included. (ii) Circular design emphasizes the need to design products that are more durable, repairable and recyclable to enable circularity. It also draws attention to the need to standardize components and materials in order to facilitate modularity / adaptability of product design and reverse flow. (ii) Circular business model emphasizes the transition of companies to circular business models such as renting, receiving services or sharing economy (Agrawal et al., 2019).

The first step to make a CE possible is to recycle the products used and establish closed-loop systems. In the background of the CE movement, it contains awareness elements such as recycling, biodegradability, environmentally friendly production and environmental awareness.

Today, the environmental awareness has reached to the highest importance level, and hygiene sensitivity has increased due to the COVID-19 global pandemics. Therefore, the need for cleaning materials and disposable products has reached high levels too. In line with the efforts to raise environmental awareness about the damage caused by plastic materials to nature, the production of disposable products has started to be shifted to the paper industry. Due to COVID-19, the increase in the ordering home frequency with plastic bags, the widespread use of plastic gloves, increased the use of plastics in this period. For example, the consumption of paper packaging in Latin American countries has decreased, up to the data of 2015 (Barisauskas, 2020). This situation, which is introduced as “from the pandemics to the plastics epidemic” (Ak, 2020), started to meet the seasonal demand increase, environmental awareness and policies in a different way, and paved the way for the production of paper equivalents of plastic products. Examples include paper straws (Termokap, 2020), paper plates, paper bags (Milliyet, 2020), paper diaper packaging (Hijyen Ambalaj, 2020).

The environmental pollution of plastics which remains undissolved in nature for centuries, the harm to marine organisms that is detected in the sea as micro-plastic and nano-plastic (Greenpeace, 2019), and the transfer of these harmful substances to seawater, fish, land creatures and human beings, even to the placenta (BBC, 2020) has triggered the demand for paper packaging.