Apply DEMATEL to Analyzing Key Barriers to Implementing the Circular Economy: An Application for the Textile Sector

Continuous improvement and innovation are solid foundations for the textile sector to maintain excellent growth and active sustainability. As the limited resources possessed by textile companies generally result in the incapability of implementing circular economy (CE) strategies simultaneously, recently, researchers advocate that organizations should analyze the influential inter-relationship between key barriers to explore the more dominant determinants for designing improved actions for implementing CE in the textile sector. CE implementation in the textile sector appears to be in its infancy. Although much attention has been paid to CE implementation barriers, the present study tries to fill this research gap by analyzing the causal relationships among the CE barriers in the textile sector. Therefore, the twelve barriers are identified by an extensive literature review, and the application of the Fuzzy Delphi Method (FDM) based on the expert options from the textile sector. Subsequently, the causal inter-relationship among the key CE barriers is based on expert opinions using the decision-making trial and evaluation laboratory (DEMATEL). The results of this study indicate that three key barriers require quick action: “consumers lack knowledge and awareness about reused/recycle (B1)”, “lack of successful business models and frameworks to implement CE (B3)”, and “lack of an information exchange system between different stakeholders (B8)”. In addition, the results provide significant managerial implications, including implementations of CE in the textile sector. Not only should the government build regulations and friendly laws and encourage environmentally-friendly materials but the textile companies should also focus or monitor the recycling methods and quality to overcome the CE implementation issues. In addition, this study contributes to the textile sector transition toward CE by using the novel methodology for determining and prioritizing the key barriers. Finally, this work would help top management and the practitioners to better design effective infrastructural strategies for the textile sector transition towards CE.