Business community teams up with environmental agency to encourage green shift in commerce
Sophie Demers
The Chamber de Commerce de Gatineau (GCC) and the Conseil Régional de l'Environnement et du Développement Durable de l'Outaouais (CREDDO) encourage Outaouais businesses to participate in the circular economy in 2022.
The GCC and CREDDO define the circular economy as an economic model that aims to rethink each stage of production and consumption to optimize resource use and design sustainable products and services.
Adopting a circular economy model allows businesses to waste less resources, promote the movement of materials while reducing business costs, and reduce or eliminate resource extraction linked to production and consumption.
Despite many experts and elected officials supporting the circular economy, the transition to this economic model has been very slow. According to the GCC and CREDDO, the decisions made still reflect the linear model that focuses on producing, consuming, and discarding.
The Bureau d'Audiences Publiques sur l’Environnement (BAPE) recently published the “Rapport d'Enquête et d'Audience Publique - L'état des lieux et la gestion des résidus ultimes”, in which they highlight the circular economy as one of the 11 priority directions to achieve their set objectives and reverse negative environmental trends.
According to the GCC and CREDDO, the circular economy can be a powerful tool to enable businesses to be profitable, to meet growing demands from their customers, retain their workforce and contribute efforts to address climate change.
The GCC’s mission is to revitalize the Gatineau economy and be the voice of the business community. The GCC facilitates networking, represents the interests of the business community and initiates practice-sharing activities in order to develop the local economy.
CREDDO's mission is to bring local stakeholders together in the Outaouais region to implement solutions in response to major environmental and sustainable development issues.
A GCC representative said that businesses can contact them or CREDDO for more information.