RESOURCE EFFICIENCY AND SHARE Investment return from forward thinking compan


By Gerrit Heyns, Partner, Osmosis Investment Management www.osmosisim.com


LINEAR VERSUS CIRCULAR R


esource efficiency is a natural and progressive economic phenomenon and a fundamental characteristic of our industrial economy. It is the practical and continuous innovation that comes from a combination of necessity and ingenuity. It is a catalyst that hastens the transition to a more sustainable model of economic prosperity in an environment of resource constraint.


For a business, resource efficiency is an economic imperative to counter rising input costs, widen margins and drive profitability. It is also a compelling measure for determining a company’s ability to cope with the challenges of decreasing resource supply and increasing price volatility. And it is a valuation metric that distinguishes businesses that are able to create more from less.


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Early economic theorists modelled our industrial economy in a vacuum. Inputs and impacts were of little or no consideration. They were not negligent and it’s not overly surprising considering the abundance of inputs and perceived lack of impact during the hay day of industrialisation. Throughout the period of rapid industrial growth, both policy and action reflected a mentality of plenty. Fuels were cheap and disposal was frankly, irrelevant. But as Bob Dylan tells us, the times, they are a changing.


Ours is a linear economy, based on the cultivation or extraction of raw material and the subsequent manufacture of material into goods. We distribute these goods to markets and consume with abandon. We apply energy and labour at each stage, creating waste and refuse along the way,


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