EVALUATING SUSTAINABILITY ASPECTS THROUGH STRATEGIC DIMENSIONS OF CIRCULAR ECONOMY IN INDIA’S ELECTRONICS INDUSTRY: AN INTEGRATED FUZZY MCDM APPROACH

Abstract:

The rapid growth of the electronics industry in India has led to increasing e-waste challenges. This has resulted in sustainability concerns as a huge amount of this waste is handled by the informal sector without appropriate knowledge of its disposal. Transition towards circular economy (CE) is thus imperative to address these issues. This study seeks to identify and evaluate the strategic dimensions of CE implementation in India’s electronics sector with respect to five key sustainability aspects: environmental, social, economic, governance, and cultural. Linguistic responses collected from industry/academia experts via a structured questionnaire were analysed using a Pythagorean fuzzy (PF)-integrated multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) approach. To derive the objective weights of 22 strategic dimensions, the PF-CRITIC (CRiteria Importance Through Intercriteria Correlation) technique was applied. Thereafter, the PF-CoCoSo (Combined Compromise Solution) method was used along with the derived weights to rank the five sustainability aspects, thereby highlighting the aspects most strongly influenced by the strategic dimensions of CE adoption. Environmental sustainability was ranked highest, followed by governance, economic, social, and cultural aspects. The CRITIC weights showed moderate variation, with collection access, market incentives, and awareness exhibiting relatively higher objective weights within the decision matrix. A sensitivity analysis was conducted to assess the reliability and stability of the results. The findings provide a relative positioning of sustainability priorities and offer practical guidance for translating CE strategies into action. Specifically, policymakers and industry stakeholders can use the identified priorities to strengthen CE initiatives, thereby supporting a more focused circular transition in India’s electronics sector.

Keywords: Circular economy, Sustainability, Strategic dimensions, Electronics, MCDM