Unveiling and ranking circular economy constructs in textile & apparel industry: Exploration of MCDA approach

Abstract

Bangladesh’s Textile and Apparel (T&A) industry has been a prominent force in shaping the country’s economy, upholding the tagline “Made in Bangladesh” worldwide. Given the need, this work has focused on examining the key drivers and barriers to implementing the Circular Economy (CE) in the Bangladeshi T&A industry. The rigorous literature review and responses from industry and academic experts helped select the 17 primary drivers and 19 barriers to be analyzed for the study. A closed-ended questionnaire was circulated to gather responses from experts, and the significance of broader constructs in shaping each. Fuzzy DEMATEL and Fuzzy COPRAS, two of the most prominent MCDA models with fuzzy logic, have been employed to analyze cause-effect relationships, the degree-of-effect diagram, and the key areas to focus on. The findings revealed that Lack of funding, Inadequate training and education, and Lack of applicable and feasible CE-driving policies are the top three barriers, with a comprehensive impact on all other barriers. Stakeholder collaboration, Human and animal health, and Circularity in product usage are the key motivating factors for the CE implementation. The COPRAS model further explained that managers should focus on the governmental, organizational, social, and collaborative sectors as soon as possible to keep Bangladesh's T&A industry on the path to sustainability. There are several notable studies on CE practices in the T&A industry. However, in Bangladesh, very few studies have been conducted. This study first investigates the drivers and challenges of CE practices using a multidimensional methodological approach.