Today, coffee cups, appliances and even plants for office decoration can be rented. Opportunities of the sharing economy were discussed on March 12 at the Panel Discussion «B2B Sharing Economy. Renting Instead of Buying» held as part of the 24th International Forum «Ecology of the Big City».

«Resource sharing is one of the most important components of circular economy, or closed-loop economy», began Sergey Khmelev, CEO of the first national pooling operator «MPS Pooling Systems», the conversation.

Pooling is a three-way model of interaction between the supplier, the retailer and the pooling operator: the supplier delivers the goods to the retailer, after which the operator takes the plastic container to put it back into circulation. «Using recycled containers instead of single-use cardboard packaging leads to reducing greenhouse gases up to 60%. And for business, this type of package is cheaper and more functional than cardboard», stressed Khmelev.

Aleksander Shcheglov, Managing Director of Aleksander Shcheglov’s Phytodesign Studio «CleverGreen», spoke about renting plants for offices: «We are engaged in long-term rental of tropical plants in pots, with a biologist’s care and replacement at the expense of our company. We do not rent flowering plants, as they lose their decorative value very quickly, while tropical plants retain it for 1–3 years».

Refurbishment is a procedure for restoring used electronic equipment. «We pick up used office equipment, perform full diagnostics, replace worn parts, update software, restore the case and return it with a guarantee», said Alena Egorova, Head of the Service Sector at «Superwave Group».

After the pandemic, when offices began to abandon the large number of equipment because of their employees to transit to remote work, the company opened the equipment rent. Alena Egorova believes that those who rent the devices have reduced investments in equipment and repair costs, as well as the burden on the IT department is relieved.

Capsharing makes it possible to dispense with disposable coffee cups. «16.5 million disposable cups are used in Russia every day, and the project «Emkost» intended for providing and maintaining reusable polypropylene cups, which we are implementing jointly with Ecoplatform, creates a new culture of takeaway coffee consumption in Russia», said Kristina Nazarova, Head of the Department of Sustainable Development at «Opticom».

Workwear, carpets and textiles for restaurants and hotels are available for rent at «Lindaily». «Compared to a regular purchase, the sharing model allows predicting costs at the enterprise and flexibly approach workwear and textiles, considering seasonal business downturns», explained Nikolay Stotyka, CEO of «Lindaily».

«Renting instead of buying allows, among other things, improving the quality of the goods, since they are actively tested», says Tatiana Nagorskaya, Chairperson of the Board of the Association for Ecology and Environmental Protection «RazDelny Sbor».

«In my opinion, our company is an ambassador of b2b-sharing. We are an operator of exhibition spaces and practice multiple use of exhibition structures; we rent equipment, from TV and microphone to special equipment and catering; we successfully implement separate garbage collection. One of the new environmental initiatives is using recycled carpet», shared Oksana Goncharenko, an ecologist at ExpoForum International LLC, the information. She named further growth points: recycling chipboard, synthetic fabrics, grass from lawn mowing, as well as creating the platform for renting or selling materials for other areas.

According to more than half of the forum visitors surveyed, businesses need sharing services. Polina Kosobokova, Head of the Department of Cooperation and Education of the Association for Ecology and Environmental Protection «RazDelny Sbor», shared the results of the survey.

The sharing economy fully meets the modern approach to ecology, but, according to experts, for transiting to closed-loop economy at the state level, stimulating measures aimed at developing the sharing approach are needed. Following the results of the discussion, a resolution on measures of supporting b2b-sharing will be formulated.