Circular benefits of innovation in some European countries’ food industry

Abstract

The European food industry is a key area for the circular economy. Our study explores the drivers for European companies to innovate with circular benefits in the food industry, finding a lack of significant research in this area. Based on Community Innovation Survey (CIS) 2014 database, our results confirmed the hypotheses, showing that the innovation performance of companies is significantly related to circular innovation. The size of European food enterprizes in terms of turnover is also significantly associated with circular innovation. The research's most important findings are that company location, openness of the research system, and overall prevalence of environmentally related processes significantly explain the variance in circular innovation among countries.