Everyone talks about circularity. Circular economy. Circular agriculture. Circular bioeconomy. Closing loops. Recycling resources. Reducing waste. All of this matters. But circularity alone is not enough.

Circularity is necessary, but not sufficient

A system can be circular and still be unnecessarily indirect, wasteful, fragile or inefficient. Before we ask how to recycle something, reuse something, recover something or close a loop, we may need to ask a more basic question:

Does this pathway need to exist in the first place?

The label example

At a Food Expo, I saw a simple but powerful example from the packaging sector.

Many companies use labels on boxes. That sounds harmless enough. But a label is not just a label. It often means additional material, printing, adhesive, liner waste, transport, application systems and later a separate waste stream.

The standard circular question would be: How do we recycle label waste?

But the deeper design question is: Do we need the label at all?

In the example presented, the alternative was direct printing or stamping on the packaging itself. Instead of producing a separate label, applying it and then managing the waste, the information is placed directly on the box.

It is a small example, but it reveals a much bigger principle.

Sometimes the best circular solution is not a better recycling loop. Sometimes it is eliminating the need for the loop.

Circularity improves systems. Design questions can transform them.

Circularity asks:
How do we keep materials in use?

That is an essential question.
But it is not the only question.

We also need to ask:
Which materials should be used in the first place?
Which pathways are necessary?
Which loops are worth closing — and which loops should be avoided?

This distinction matters because a circular system can still preserve an inefficient design. We can make a long, indirect pathway more circular, but that does not automatically make it optimal.

A circular detour is still a detour.

The same principle applies to food systems

Food systems are full of biological pathways. Some are direct. Some are long. Some are resilient. Some are fragile. Some reduce pressure on ecosystems. Others multiply it.

One example is omega-3.

EPA and DHA — the long-chain omega-3 fatty acids widely discussed in human nutrition — originate in microalgae. Yet in many current systems, these nutrients are routed through multiple biological and industrial steps before reaching people.

A simplified pathway looks like this:
Microalgae → small fish → fish oil → aquafeed → farmed fish → humans

A more efficient pathway is possible:
Microalgae → algal oil → aquafeed → farmed fish → humans

But the shortest, most efficient route is this:
Microalgae → algal oil → humans

This is not only a fisheries issue. It is a nutrient-routing issue.

If a nutrient originates in algae, why should algae remain only the hidden beginning of a long chain? Why not ask whether shorter, more resilient routes should play a larger role?

The point is not that every current pathway can or should disappear overnight. The point is that bioeconomy strategy should not only ask how to make existing pathways more circular. It should also ask which biological pathways are actually necessary, efficient and resilient.

Agriculture has the same problem

Circular agriculture is often discussed through manure recycling, nutrient recovery and closing loops between crops and animals.
These are important improvements.
But again, they do not answer the whole question.

If plant protein is grown, fed to animals and then converted into animal protein for human consumption, the pathway may be made more circular through manure use, feed optimization and waste recovery.

But the deeper question remains:
Which nutrients need to pass through animals, and which could reach people more directly?

Circular agriculture can reduce waste inside the existing system.
But it may still leave the basic nutrient route unchanged.
That is why circularity must be paired with pathway design.

Bioeconomy should not mean “more biomass at any cost”

A sustainable bioeconomy cannot be built only on producing more biomass.

It must also ask where biomass should go, which uses create the highest value, which pathways create the lowest total pressure, and which routes are unnecessarily long.

Biomass is not automatically sustainable just because it is biological.

A bio-based system can still compete for land, water, nutrients, energy and infrastructure. It can still lock societies into inefficient flows. It can still create new dependencies.

So the question is not only:
How do we replace fossil resources with biological resources?

It is also:
How do we design biological systems intelligently?

Circularity is one dimension. Pathway design is another.

Circularity remains essential.

We need to reduce waste.
We need to reuse materials.
We need to recover nutrients.
We need to close loops where loops make sense.

But circularity should not become a substitute for deeper design thinking.
The next stage of sustainability may require a hierarchy of questions:

First: Can we avoid the unnecessary step?
Then: Can we shorten the pathway?
Then: Can we reuse or cascade resources?
Then: Can we recycle what remains?

Recycling is far better than disposal.
But avoiding unnecessary material or unnecessary biological detours is often better still.

The missing question

The bioeconomy conversation often focuses on resources: biomass, waste streams, residues, feedstocks, circularity and valorization.

But perhaps one question is still missing:
Which biological pathways should exist at all?

That question can be applied to packaging, food, nutrients, agriculture, aquaculture, fermentation, algae, mycoprotein, microbial proteins and many other fields.

It does not reject circularity.
It deepens it.
Circularity asks how to keep systems moving.
Pathway design asks whether they are moving in the right direction.

A sustainable bioeconomy will need both.