Circular Turku

The City of Turku is committed to a resource wise future with zero emissions. This means no waste and sustainable use of natural resources by the year 2040. Turku aims at being carbon neutral already by 2029 and climate positive thereafter. In order to reach these ambitious goals, the city collaborates with regional partners to accelerate the circular transition of the Turku region. 

The Circular Turku roadmap provides a framework for concrete interventions that will lead the Turku region toward resource wisdom:

• The roadmap takes a systemic perspective to identify interventions that span the different roles a city can play in the circular economy transition using ICLEI´s Circular City Actions Framework and applying it to 5 thematic areas: Food, construction, mobility, energy, water.
• It is the first circular economy roadmap to consider social equity by including a social risk assessment for each of the planned interventions.
• In the city’s bottom-up approach, over 200+ stakeholders from local businesses to research institutions, public companies and national and regional actors, were involved consultations to define the circular economy interventions included in the Circular Turku roadmap. Also  ICLEI (Local Governments for Sustainability) and Finnish Innovation Fund Sitra were supporting in making the roadmap.

Circular economy is in the core of a successful climate policy with positive impacts on environment, economy and wellbeing. A circular climate policy also addresses the indirect emissions embedded in products and materials along their entire lifecycle. 

 

Turku is a member of several international partnerships and networks advancing circularity: 

• The ICLEI Green Circular Cities Coalition, and strengthens thereby the global circularity agenda with other cities from around the globe, sharing best practices and exchanging knowledge on circular solutions. 
• The International Urban Co-operation (IUC) city pairing programme, where Turku partners with Japanese Nagano City and Obuse Town to facilitate the sharing of circular solutions.