Circular economy Archives

“Auchan Hungary, as a responsible company, is aware of the need for retailers to take action for a more sustainable future. One more thing I would like to highlight in this context is education, as this is part of our sustainability goals. We are constantly working to ensure that changes are noticed by our customers and that they are comfortable with them. We also want to promote a collective change of attitude through our environmentally friendly investments and measures, as we have many people coming to us every day who see what Auchan is doing in this area.”
Viktória Lucenko, CEO

Company Name:

Auchan Magyarország Kft.

Implementation Year:

2022

Focus areas:

Climate protection, Climate adaptation, Waste management, Circular economy, Consumer education

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In March 2022, the retail chain also took up the fight against the polluting effects of the textile industry by launching a second-hand clothing business called New Life by Auchan. The company’s revolutionary measures to reduce electronic waste, in addition to eliminating plastic and reducing textile waste, will also include second-hand phones from July 2022. Fully refurbished mobile phones will come back with a one-year guarantee, at a much lower price than the original. This means that customers will be able to buy high-quality products at a much lower price than new, both online and in four stores.

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The textile industry has a highly polluting impact on many areas, such as increasing water pollution, greenhouse gas emissions and landfill saturation. The continuous production of clothes also leads to a significant increase in textile waste. Auchan wants to draw attention to this problem, which is why it has decided to include a second-hand clothing collection in its range, called New Life by Auchan.

Auchan places a high priority on sustainability and wants to encourage its customers to do the same. It is indeed important to seize these opportunities, because if we think that “it’s not up to me”, we are very much mistaken. A lot of small things can make a big difference, and the more of us who take this path, the more we can reduce the impact on our environment.

The New Life by Auchan collection is a great way to shop more consciously, and we can give new life to some second-hand items in our spring wardrobe. The new collection is accompanied by a heart-warming campaign, with posters with charming words like “I’m ready to start a new life with you” or a windbreaker that reads “Be my new companion and I’ll protect you from the wind”.

Program Impact and Results:

The pioneering initiative was launched on 16 March 2022 in seven Auchan stores: in Budaörs, Debrecen, Dunakeszi, Székesfehérvár, Miskolc, Szigetszentmiklós and Maglód. The second-hand clothes are tastefully arranged, and the selection is wide and includes quality women’s and men’s items. The carefully checked, sorted, good condition clothes arrive after thorough disinfection, packed, labelled and hung up in the stores. Prices for the New Life by Auchan collection range from 990 HUF to 3300 HUF.

Keywords:

NewlifebyAuchan, Auchan, secondhand, secondhand clothes, secondhand phone, secondchance

„Our aim is to create a more efficient and sustainable feed production system than ever before, using environmentally friendly technologies. We are improving our processes every day to further contribute to the development of a circular biomass-based domestic economy.”
Rajmond Percze, Managing Director

Company name:

Agroloop Hungary Kft.

Implementation Year:

2017

Focus Areas:

Circular economy, Climate change, climate adaptation

Program Objective:

Agroloop Hungary Ltd. aims to reduce European protein exposure by producing feed from locally available, low feed-grade raw materials, which it converts into premium quality feed protein and fat using fly larvae. Globally, one third of all food produced for human consumption, around 1.3 billion tonnes per year, ends up as waste or is wasted. These are often industrial-scale by-products with valuable nutritional content. Agroloop has recognised the potential of these resources and, thanks to its circular operation, is able to recycle them without any pollution.

Program Measures and Commitments:

We are also investing more than €20 million to expand our black soldier fly rearing and processing operations on the outskirts of Budapest. In our circular model, we feed insect larvae to food by-products at the bottom of the feed value chain, and then use the larvae to produce premium feed ingredients for pets and livestock. Since many apples are grown in Hungary, juice producers produce a lot of pomace and fruit pomace. This is wet and does not keep very long, so it cannot be transported very far. The same is true for unused parts of maize, or even wheat bran, but it is also the raw material for packaged salads, and for insects, for example, cabbage stalks or unused parts of salads are perfect. It is from these ‘organic by-products’, which others have already discarded or burnt, that the biomass is produced to feed the black soldier fly larvae. The larvae rapidly increase their body mass, grow in an automated system, confined in thousands of crates, and eventually all the adult larvae and the compost (insect excrement) produced as by-products are used. The premium quality feed protein and oil provides an excellent feed material for pet food (dogs, cats) and livestock feed (pigs, poultry). The potting soil-like excrement of the larvae is used to produce compost that is both suitable for restoring the eviscerated soil and also provides essential nutrients for the plants. In this system, resources are used for as long as possible, waste and pollution are minimised and products are recycled, repaired or reused at the end of their life cycle.

Program Impact and Results:

Unlike feed protein from the average livestock production, insect larvae and their feedstocks can be produced on a comparatively smaller land area and using less water, with lower carbon emissions, per unit weight. Insects are cold-blooded and therefore use significantly less energy during their life cycle, requiring only 10 litres of water to produce 1 kg of high quality feedstock, compared to, for example, a water footprint of 2,000 l/kg for soy production, an average of 5,500 l/kg for pork and up to 16,000 l/kg for red meat.

Keywords:

circular economy, insect protein

„New Life by Auchan”

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Protein production in circulation

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