ISO 59004 and the circular economy explained

ISO 59004 is the international standard that sets the shared vocabulary, principles and guidance for the circular economy. Published in 2024, it fixes what a circular economy actually means, names the principles behind it, and gives organisations practical guidance on how to act on them.

It is the foundation of the ISO 59000 family, and the first place to look for a definition of circularity that holds up beyond your own company.

ISO 59004 does not stand on its own. It is the base of a whole series, and it defines the words that ISO 59010 and ISO 59020 both build on.

The essentials of ISO 59004

Below are the essential facts that define ISO 59004.

What a circular economy actually means

Ask ten people what "circular economy" means and you tend to get ten answers, most of them a version of "recycling". Closing that gap is exactly why ISO 59004 exists. Recycling is part of the picture, but it is closer to the last resort than the whole idea.

ISO 59004 pins the definition down in one line:

A circular economy is an economic system that keeps a circular flow of resources going by recovering, retaining or adding to their value, while contributing to sustainable development.

In plainer terms, it flips the model most economies still run on:

• Linear (take, make, dispose). Pull in raw material, make a product, use it once, throw it away.
• Circular. Keep the same materials cycling at their highest value for as long as possible, so less new material comes in and less ends up as waste.

The reason for writing this into an international standard is simple. Once the definition is fixed, a "circular" claim, target or strategy means the same thing whether it comes from a supplier, a regulator or a customer.

For the plain-language version of the idea, see our glossary entry on the circular economy.

The six principles behind ISO 59004

The heart of the standard is a set of six principles. They are not a checklist you tick off. They are the ideas every circular decision should trace back to. ISO 59004 sets out six principles:

1. Systems thinking. Look at the whole system and the long term, not one product or one quarter. A change that looks circular in isolation can create waste somewhere else.
2. Value creation. Design to recover, retain and add value to resources through efficient use, rather than burning through them once.
3. Value sharing. A circular economy runs across a network, not a single company, so the value it creates should be shared fairly with the partners who help create it.
4. Resource stewardship. Manage the flow of materials responsibly, closing, slowing and narrowing the loops so less new material is needed.
5. Resource traceability. Keep the data. You cannot manage or prove circularity without knowing what materials you use and where they end up.
6. Ecosystem resilience. Protect and regenerate natural systems, and stay within the planet's limits.

The standard does not stop at naming them. For each principle it offers a vision of what good looks like and a set of possible actions an organisation can take, which is the "guidance for implementation" part of the title. It reads as a starting map, not a rulebook.

Who ISO 59004 is for

ISO 59004 is written for any organisation trying to build a circular strategy rather than just talk about one. In practice that means:

• Sustainability leads setting the direction.
• Product and packaging designers making the daily material choices.
• Procurement and strategy teams deciding what to buy and build.

Because it is deliberately generic (any size, any sector, any country), its real job is to give all of those people the same starting language. A packaging designer in one country and a procurement lead in another can point at the same definition and the same six principles, instead of arguing about what "circular" is supposed to mean.

Where ISO 59004 fits for producers

For a producer putting packaging or products on the EU market, the circular economy is not an abstract goal. It is the direction the law is already pushing:

• Recyclability (PPWR Article 6). Packaging has to be designed for recycling and graded on how recyclable it is.
• Recycled content (PPWR Article 7). Mandatory minimums for plastic packaging start in 2030.
• EPR fees. Extended producer responsibility fees are increasingly tied to how recyclable your packaging is.

So where does ISO 59004 sit in that picture? Being honest about it:

• What it is not. It does not make you compliant with any of those rules, and it is neither a certification nor a reporting format.
• What it is. The shared foundation. One agreed definition of circularity and one agreed set of principles, so your strategy and your claims rest on something solid.

From there you move to the standards that actually measure and prove things:

• ISO 59020 measures how circular you are.
• ISO 18604 backs a recyclable-packaging claim.
• ISO 14021 covers self-declared environmental claims.
• ISO 14025 covers environmental product declarations (EPDs).

ISO 59004 is the map. Those standards are the instruments. Keeping a clean record of which products and packaging follow which standard is exactly the kind of thing an EPR reporting platform is built to track.

ISO 59004 and the rest of the ISO 59000 family

ISO 59004 is the foundation of the ISO 59000 series, the family of circular-economy standards from ISO/TC 323. The three core standards were all published in 2024 and are designed to work together, with 59004 defining the words the other two use.

Two more sit around them. ISO 59014, published in 2024, covers secondary (recovered) materials, and ISO 59040, published in 2025, defines the Product Circularity Data Sheet, a standard format for sharing a product's circularity data. Two technical reports, ISO/TR 59031 and ISO/TR 59032, round out the series.

The simplest way to hold it in your head: ISO 59004 defines the words, ISO 59010 helps you change your model, and ISO 59020 measures the result.

ISO 59004 questions answered

Short, plain answers to the questions people ask most about ISO 59004.

What is ISO 59004?

ISO 59004 is the international standard, published in 2024, that sets the shared vocabulary, principles and guidance for the circular economy. It fixes what a circular economy means, names six principles behind it, and gives organisations practical guidance on how to act on them.

Is ISO 59004 a certification?

No. It is a guidance standard you read and align to, not a scheme you get audited and certified against. None of the core ISO 59000 circular-economy standards are certifications.

What edition of ISO 59004 is current?

The first edition, published in 2024. It was released alongside ISO 59010 and ISO 59020 as the first three standards in the ISO 59000 series.

How does ISO 59004 define the circular economy?

As an economic system that keeps a circular flow of resources going by recovering, retaining or adding to their value, while contributing to sustainable development. In plain terms, it is the opposite of the take, make, dispose model.

What are the six principles of ISO 59004?

Systems thinking, value creation, value sharing, resource stewardship, resource traceability and ecosystem resilience. Every circular decision an organisation makes should trace back to them.

Is ISO 59004 mandatory?

No, it is a voluntary standard. But the circular economy it describes is increasingly required in practice by laws like the EU's packaging regulation, so following it puts you ahead of where the rules are heading.

How does ISO 59004 relate to EU packaging and EPR rules?

It does not make you compliant on its own. It gives the shared definition and principles that sit underneath circular-economy rules like PPWR, and it is the starting point for the standards that measure and substantiate circularity.

What is the difference between ISO 59004 and ISO 59020?

ISO 59004 defines the circular economy and its principles. ISO 59020 sets out how to measure and assess how circular an organisation or product actually is. You use 59004 to agree the terms and 59020 to put numbers on them.