The Transition to a New Economic Model is a Metaphysical Reconstruction
Today, the global economy is only 8.6% circular — just two years ago it was 9.1%. We have gone from bad to worse — Circularity Gap Report 2020
It has been said the Philippines ranks highest in the use of sachets and most single-use plastic. When FMCG companies who produce products in sachets are asked about this, without a blink of an eye they attribute it to our poverty. We always hear, “it is what Filipinos can afford.”
Based on that argument alone, I completely disagree.
1) Our poverty incidence is roughly around 20%, there is the rest of the population to consider.
2) Conversations and studies made with people within the poverty incidence bracket and those above it have unanimously expressed that they are looking for an accessible and convenient alternative to the sachet economy.
In the photo are single to triple use wash papers from Lush Philippines. No plastic packaging! They smell and look super good. This can be the reality of our products designed for single use. It can be done. It is being done. It can be scaled down to local budget and use of local ingredients like Calamansi, pineapple, tomatoes, and a whole lot more of tropical goodness!
The case to build a new economic model that does not generate waste but instead enrich not just business owners and capitalists but also the planet has never been more urgent. The transition to a regenerative economic model entails metaphysical reconstruction rather than just finding solutions to production, consumption, and the supply chain. We developed from the industrial revolution a value system and metaphysics that is soul and life destroying. We seem to think that man as consumer cannot afford the costs of destroying the Earth, and yet the same man as producer can make some affordances of pollution and other externalities. It is the same man, it is the same Earth.
Why the dichotomy?
