Circularity of the Economy and Sustainable Performance of Agri-Food Systems in the European Union

The transition to a circular economy is a strategic direction of the European Union, and the agri-food sector is essential in this transformation through resource consumption, climate impact and an economic role in the food chain. This study analyses the relationship between the circularity of the economy and the sustainable performance of agri-food systems in the EU-27, using Eurostat data for the period of 2014–2023. Circularity is operationalised through a composite index built from the circularity of materials and resource productivity, aggregated through principal component analysis and complemented by an alternative measure based on the average of the standardised components. Sustainable performance is assessed through economic indicators (value added and output in agriculture, value added in the food industry), environmental indicators (greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture) and, complementary, energy indicators (energy intensity in the food industry), the latter being analysed separately on the available observations. The results do not indicate clear aggregate differences in sustainable performance associated with circularity measured at the macro level over the analysed period, underlining the importance of connecting circularity objectives with interventions and indications specific to the agri-food chain for monitoring and policy design at the EU level.