Expediency and risks of organizing the activities of agricultural enterprises on the basis of circular economy

Abstract

The circular economy is an important trend in the development of agriculture and as well as its challenge. The circular approach allows to find effective ways to reduce costs, enter new markets, in particular foreign ones, as well as strengthen the social responsibility of business and product consumers. The purpose of the study is to determine the expediency and risks of organizing the activities of agricultural enterprises based on the circular economy in modern conditions. The strategic importance of agriculture in Ukraine, which provides more than 40% of export revenue, is emphasized. The situation in Ukraine with the treatment of agricultural crops for harvest with fertilizers and pesticides is analyzed. The main difficulties are related to the insufficient use of organic fertilizers, although there have already been positive developments. The main advantages of circular agribusiness, which are related to: 1) minimization of waste in the process of production and consumption of products and services, which will reduce their negative impact on the environment; 2) the high potential of scaling circular economy methods, which contributes to the growing involvement of investment capital in the field of agriculture. Specific features of risks that create barriers to the implementation of circular economy in the activities of agricultural enterprises in modern conditions, are determined. Therefore, they are grouped as follows: 1) financial (long-term investment costs for circular models and technologies; the principle of "green finance"); 2) marketing (planned moral aging as an effective option for ensuring sales volumes in the future); 3) organizational (difficult process of restructuring the current business model into an economical and circular one; weak awareness of the sustainable development concept and its connection with circular effects). Attention is focused on the fact that when planning the transition to circular business models, the strategic task of increasing the share of added value of agricultural products should be followed. Keywords: circular economy, agricultural enterprise, waste management, potential.