ADB Data Room: Circular Economy

The Circular Economy is an emerging theme internationally. A Circular Economy is a systemic approach to decouple economic development and activity from consuming finite resources. A Circular Economy will allow ADB to tackle global environmental challenges, including climate change, resource management, biodiversity loss, waste, and pollution, while supporting economic development and reducing poverty.

ADB Data Room: Managing Infectious Medical Waste during the COVID-19 Pandemic

During the COVID-19 outbreak in Hubei Province, People’s Republic of China (PRC), infectious medical waste increased by 600% from 40 tons per day to 240 tons per day. This quickly overwhelmed existing medical transport and disposal infrastructure around hospitals.

Other countries are likely to face similar challenges. It is critical that additional waste management systems are put in place to help reduce the further spread of COVID-19 and the emergence of other diseases.

Ji-Hye Jo

Dr. Ji-Hye Jo is researching circular economy, resource circulation, and carbon neutrality at the Korea Environment Institute (KEI). Her work focuses on various aspects of the circular economy, including the recycled materials market, sustainable product design, resource circulation strategies for key items like plastics and batteries, and the sub-regulations under the Promotion of Transition to Circular Economy and Society Act.  
 

Aditya Handa

Aditya Handa is the founder and managing director of Abellon Group. Abellon is engaged in finding sustainable development-led solutions to India's most difficult problems, such as climate change, waste management, energy security, food security, and realizing untapped human potential.

Abellon Clean Energy is India's leading company in the domain of waste to energy focussed on utilizing waste such as municipal waste, agricultural waste, and others economically and environmentally optimally.

Suraj Nandakumar

With 12+ years of experience in implementing city planning & infrastructure projects of over $26Bn, Suraj Nandakumar shares a deep interest in transforming cities and its dynamic with waste, especially plastics, through Recity. 

Suraj has been instrumental in shaping Recity’s journey to deliver impact through integrated circular waste management projects across 12+ cities in India by strategically fostering cross-value chain collaborations. 

Chettiyappan Visvanathan

Dr. Chettiyappan Visvanathan, is an Emeritus  Professor of Asian Institute of Technology.  Currently he is working with  Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering of  Mahidol University. He has a Ph.D. (Chemical /Environmental Engineering) from Institute National Polytechnique, Toulouse, France.  His main areas of research interests include: Sustainable Consumption and Production, Membrane  technologies for water and wastewater treatment and solid waste disposal and management. 

Nguyen Thi Thu Trang

Trang is Co-Founder and Deputy Director of the Centre for Supporting Green Development (GreenHub), a Vietnamese NGO. She is trained as an expert in marine waste management, leading projects on plastic pollution, environment, and development for 15 years, promoting partnerships and information networks between government, business, and civil society. Her collective action expertise has been applied as an invited trainer of plastic waste management in Asia Pacific.

Marie Gouttebroze

Marie Gouttebroze works as a Senior Project Manager in the field of Waste Management and Circular Economy at Seureca, the consulting engineering company of Veolia.

She has a cross-sectional experience with consulting engagements focusing on integrated solid waste management systems. She works on various projects related to circular economy and recycling, in particular on plastic pollution identification and quantification and on improving plastic value chains.