A circular economy system for breaking the development dilemma of 'ecological Fragility Economic poverty' vicious circle: A CEEPS-SD analysis

In nowadays, there are a large number of regions in the world facing with double pressures of ecological fragility and economic poverty. In these regions, if human choose traditional development mode to constantly exploited natural resources for developing economy, the environment will be hardly destroyed or polluted, and finally cause larger economic loss and make poverty more serious. It formed a development dilemma of environmental fragility-economic poverty vicious circle (FPVC). How to break FPVC has been the goal being pursued in the literature worldwide. In this study, we constructed a Circular-Economy-Effect-and-Policy-Simulation-System-Dynamics (CEEPS-SD) model, evaluated the ecological economic comprehensive effects and simulated the future development trends of the circular economy system (CES) which we have planned, constantly tracked and improved in Anding District of Northwest China for 16 years, that is a typical FPVC area. The evaluation and simulation results notably evidenced that the CES had four ecological economic benefits: livestock faeces pollution elimination, water saving, agricultural waste recycling, as well as energy conservation and emission reduction. Through long-term and stable operation, the CES can expand its ecological economic comprehensive benefits constantly and finally eliminate the double pressures of ecological fragility and economic poverty. This study could help large number similar FPVC areas in the world to scientifically build, manage, evaluate, simulate and optimize CES for getting rid of FPVC and achieving sustainable development, which has important theoretical significance and practical value. (C) 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.