“The future of the circular economy will be determined not by recyclers alone, but by supply chain leaders.”
Petco’s CEO, Telly Chauke, recently joined industry leaders at the Chain Connect Conference 2026 in Johannesburg, where she shared insights on “The Role of Supply Chain Leaders in Packaging Recovery and Recycling.”
As Telly explained in her presentation, for decades, supply chains had been designed around a linear model, which was built for extraction, consumption and disposal.
Now, under a more circular model, she said supply chains had a new, critical role to play in preventing valuable resources from leaking out of the system and keeping materials circulating at their highest value for as long as possible.
While many companies had perfected forward logistics, Telly noted that few had invested the equivalent effort in bringing the materials back.
She stressed that reverse logistics were central to material recovery and encouraged supply chain leaders to assist in strengthening the collections base by:
Telly also emphasised the importance of integrated collection systems and stronger partnerships with waste pickers, collectors, buy-back centres, cooperatives and small recycling enterprises to improve material recovery efficiencies.
In the era of mandatory extended producer responsibility (EPR), the product packaging’s journey does not end when it reaches the consumer; it ends when it becomes a new package or product.
At Petco, we believe nobody closes the loop alone. Collaboration, shared goals and investment across the packaging value chain are essential to keeping materials in circulation and building a more sustainable future.
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