Circular economy strategy draft: consultation analysis

Introduction

Background

The Circular Economy (Scotland) Act 2024 was passed by the Scottish Parliament on 26 June 2024. This landmark legislation established a framework for Scotland to transition from a linear economy, whereby products are made, used and then disposed of, to a circular economy that emphasises reduce, reuse, recycling and recover. It established the legislative framework to support Scotland’s transition to a zero waste and circular economy, significantly increase reuse and recycling rates, and modernise and improve waste and recycling services. The Act mandates that Scottish Ministers publish a Circular Economy Strategy that outlines objectives, priorities for action, and arrangements for monitoring progress, and which makes regulations to set circular economy targets.

Following the introduction of the Act, the Scottish Government published Scotland's Circular Economy and Waste Route Map to 2030 in December 2024. This sets out an ambitious plan to deliver 11 priority actions arranged under four strategic aims.

The Scottish Government is now in the process of developing the first Circular Economy Strategy required under the Act. The intention is for this strategy to provide a high-level framework for Scotland’s transition to a circular economy. This strategy seeks to build upon the Route Map by setting out the strategic direction to 2045, specifically looking at policy mechanisms, priority sectors, product stewardship, and setting out a monitoring and indicator framework ahead of setting targets in 2027.

The Consultation

The Scottish Government undertook a public consultation on the Draft Circular Economy Strategy. This was open for 12 weeks, from 21 October 2025 to 13 January 2026.

The consultation asked 31 questions in total. This included:

• 27 open questions (which invited free-text responses); and
• 4 closed questions (which required respondents to select from a list of options).

The consultation was available on Citizen Space, the Scottish Government’s online portal for public consultations. In addition, respondents could submit written responses via email or post.

Respondent Profile

Overall, 190 responses received via Citizen Space, email and post were included in the data analysis. Although 191 responses were received in total, one response (from an individual) was removed during the data review and cleaning process. This was because that response provided feedback for only one question, but the comments focused on engaging people in consultations generally, with no content relevant to the questions, topics or subject matter of this specific consultation.

Most responses (87%, n=165) were submitted via Citizen Space, while 25 responses (13%) were submitted via email or post and were manually entered into the dataset. In addition, most responses were provided by organisations (78%, n=148), with 22% (n=42) from individuals.

Organisational responses were disaggregated by sector, as shown in the table below.

Campaign Responses

In addition to the Citizen Space, email and postal responses, a campaign, organised by Friends of the Earth Scotland, also generated a large number of responses. In total, 1,273 campaign responses were received, including:

• 1,175 standard campaign responses (which were identical in nature); and
• 98 non-standard campaign responses (which included edited, reduced or additional feedback).

Any edited and additional feedback was entered into the analysis dataset at the relevant question, analysed and reported alongside all other responses. All standard campaign responses, and standard content from non-standard campaign responses were logged in the dataset, counted and summarised in the report.

It should be noted that the campaign responses did not include responses to any of the closed quantitative questions (i.e. where respondents were asked to select a response from a list of options). Therefore, the tables presented below focus only on the 190 responses received via Citizen Space, email and post. Campaign respondents also did not provide a response to all open/qualitative questions.

Caveats and Reporting Conventions

Not all respondents answered all questions. In addition, some respondents answered the closed element at individual questions but did not provide free-text comments at the open question element and vice versa. For completeness, all data provided were included in the analysis. Further, all responses were treated with equal weight throughout the analysis, with themes identified and reported below based on how frequently the topics were raised.

As much of this report is based on qualitative data, it was not possible to quantify the different views given using raw numbers. However, the following descriptions have been used throughout when presenting qualitative findings to add context. It should be noted, however, that these terms need to be interpreted relative to the size of the group being discussed, for example, ‘some’ will represent a higher number of respondents when describing those who discussed an issue among all respondents compared to those who discussed it within a sub-sample:

• Most/many/the majority - more than half of respondents;
• Some - roughly between a quarter and half of the respondents;
• Several - more than five respondents to around a quarter of the respondents;
• A few - two to around five respondents; and
• One/an individual - just one respondent.

It should be noted that three individuals provided identical feedback to one organisation that responded. While there was no evidence of a formal campaign in this respect, there was clear co-ordination of responses, with individuals adopting the organisational response either largely or entirely. As these responses were provided by different respondents, and their relationship to the organisation was unknown, all responses were retained and included in the analysis for completeness.

There was also evidence of co-ordinated responses being submitted by organisations. For example, three health based public bodies provided largely identical responses, with only minor differences in content. A further two health based public bodies’ responses also showed co-ordination, often making similar points to the other three. In addition, there was also co-ordination between some third sector organisations, and among other organisations from different sectors. Again, these responses were either identical at individual questions (or largely across the consultation), or contained identical elements within broader content. Further, there were a few organisations who explicitly endorsed or noted support for the responses given by others at individual questions. Again, for completeness, all responses were retained and included in the analysis.

While the inclusion of coordinated responses was not considered to have biased the results, as the issues discussed in these responses was often similar to others, this co-ordination and duplication must be borne in mind when considering the following results.

While the total sample consisted of individuals and respondents from different organisational sectors, there was significant overlap in the views expressed by different groups. Some individuals may have worked in some of the relevant sectors, while others were influenced by (or coordinated their response with) organisational responses. Similarly, there was overlap in the views put forward across different organisational sectors, with very few issues being sector specific.

It should also be noted that several respondents provided highly unique and specialised responses related to their sector or area of interest. Where the content could be generalised and corresponded with topics discussed by others, the feedback has been incorporated in the findings below. However, there were several areas where issues were unique to a single respondent and so have not been reflected in this report.

Where respondents gave permission for their responses to be published, these can be read on the Scottish Government’s website. In addition, verbatim quotes have only been used in this report from responses where permission was provided to ‘publish the response’ in the Respondent Information Form (RIF).

Finally, the findings here reflect only the views of those who chose to respond to this consultation. It should be noted that respondents to a consultation are a self-selecting group. The findings should not, therefore, be considered as statistically robust or representative of the views of the wider population.