Green Circle Solutions Africa Launches to Help Businesses on their Sustainability Journey

Green Circle Solutions (GCS), the UK-based sustainability consultancy and carbon measurement specialist, is expanding internationally with the launch of Green Circle Solutions Africa.

Based in Cape Town and led by sustainability and events specialist Gary van der Watt, GCS Africa will offer the company’s trusted suite of SaaS based carbon calculators, ESG benchmarking and sustainability support tailored to the realities of the African market.

The new business launches at a time when many African organisations are beginning to look more closely at their environmental and social impact, but often lack practical, relevant tools to help them understand where they stand and what to do next.

“While South Africa was an early leader in event greening and sustainability forums, awareness of carbon footprinting and more detailed ESG reporting remains behind many international markets,” said Gary van der Watt, Director of Green Circle Solutions Africa

“This is particularly true in the events industry, where existing tools often take a broad-brush approach and fail to capture the full picture,” he added.

Green Circle Solutions Africa aims to change that.

Green Circle Solutions will be bringing its suite designed specifically for events and experiential activity which drill down into areas often overlooked, including staff travel, visitor transport, logistics, reuse, stand design, and wider life cycle impacts.

Gary van der Watt said: “Too many businesses think sustainability is about making dramatic changes or spending more money. It is not. In most cases, it is about understanding where you are today and making small, smarter decisions that create a better result.

“While significant strides have been made in physical sustainable design—such as the transition toward reusable engineered materials—the industry has critically lacked accessible, accurate data metrics. Green Circle Solutions Africa bridges this gap by providing event organizers with the exact software needed to quantify their Scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions in strict alignment with global standards.”

The business will initially focus on corporate clients in sectors where ESG expectations are growing fastest, including financial services, healthcare and sporting goods. It will also work with events, exhibitions and visitor-based industries, including the wine

sector, where organisations are increasingly interested in understanding the environmental impact of visitor travel alongside commercial return.

The approach is designed to reflect the particular ESG challenges and opportunities across Africa.

While environmental issues matter, businesses are also balancing concerns around employment, affordability, local supply chains and skills shortages. In many cases, sustainable choices are judged not only by their carbon impact, but by whether they create jobs, support local communities and improve long-term financial resilience.

For example, South Africa has a long-established culture of reusing materials, with exhibition panels and stands often reused dozens or even hundreds of times. In Europe, the same assets may be replaced after only a handful of uses for aesthetic reasons, Gary explained.

GCS Africa believes this local mindset offers an important advantage.

Said David Humphreys Founder & Director at Green Circle Solutions: “We are delighted to partner with Gary and his team. Expansion has always been a key business strategy, and we look forward to working together. Rather than simply importing international standards, GCS Africa will help clients recognise and build on what they are already doing well, while also identifying opportunities to improve.”

Gary van der Watt added: “South Africa already has many of the right behaviours. We reuse more. We repair more. We make more locally. The challenge is that businesses often do not see those things as sustainability because they have never measured them.

“The first step is not to chase a perfect score. It is to benchmark where you are, understand what matters most and then set realistic targets. Many businesses will discover they are doing some things brilliantly already, while others may realise they are not as green as they thought.”

Green Circle Solutions Africa will operate as a standalone business while benefiting from the expertise, technology and international reputation of Green Circle Solutions.

The partnership is expected to create new opportunities for South African businesses to access world-class sustainability support, insights and to exchange best practices and learning that can be shared globally.

Ends

About Green Circle Solutions

Green Circle Solutions helps organisations measure, manage and communicate sustainability with confidence. The business provides practical tools, accredited

training and advisory support across carbon, ESG, social value and sustainability communications.

 

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Green Circle Solutions Africa Launches and Why South Africa Needs a Different Sustainability Conversation

For years, sustainability has too often been presented as a choice between doing the right thing and making money.

Spend more. Change everything. Rip up what you already do and start again.

In reality, that is rarely how meaningful change happens.

That is why Green Circle Solutions is launching Green Circle Solutions Africa, a new Cape Town-based business led by Gary van der Watt, designed to bring more practical, relevant and commercially realistic sustainability support to South African organisations.

At its heart is a simple belief: most businesses do not need a 180-degree turn. They need a small change in direction.

Gary describes it as “a 1.5-degree shift”.

A different transport choice. A stand that is reused more effectively. Better staff travel planning. A different material. A better understanding of where emissions really come from.

Small changes, made consistently, can create a very different outcome.

In the events sector in particular, many certifications and standards still focus on a narrow set of measures. A stand may achieve a top score because it has been reused several times, but no one has asked whether the material itself has a high carbon footprint, whether it can be recycled, how far it travelled, or what labour practices sit behind it.

The result is that businesses can look sustainable on paper without necessarily understanding their true impact.

Gary, who also sits on South Africa’s event greening forum board, believes the industry now needs to raise the bar.

“Gold standard should not be the finish line if it only means we are slightly less bad than before,” he says. “We need to start thinking about what platinum or diamond would look like. That means looking at the full life cycle, not just ticking a box.”

Why South Africa Needs Its Own Approach

South Africa is in a very different position to Europe or the UK.

There is less legislation driving change. There are fewer formal reporting requirements outside certain sectors. Many businesses are still only measuring Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions, if they are measuring anything at all.

At the same time, South Africa has some of the most complex and interesting ESG challenges anywhere in the world.

Environmental impact matters, but so do jobs, affordability, local manufacturing, transport, inequality and access to opportunity.

That means sustainability decisions cannot be made in isolation.

A European business might replace exhibition panels after three uses because they no longer look perfect. In South Africa, the same panels may be reused 100 or even 200 times.

At first glance, that might seem old-fashioned. In reality, it can be far more sustainable.

Reusing an exhibition panel 200 times dramatically reduces waste and embodied carbon. It also creates work for local businesses that maintain, transport, repair and install those materials.

Gary believes this tells us something important.

South Africa already has a culture of reuse that many other markets are now trying to rediscover.

“Africa has one of the lowest carbon footprints in the world because we reuse things,” he explains. “We repair them, repurpose them and use them until they have reached the end of their life. That is not a weakness. It is something we should value and build on.”

The Missing Piece: Better Measurement

The problem is that many businesses are not measuring these things properly.

Existing carbon tools in the South African events industry often take what Gary calls a “shotgun approach”. They provide a broad overall figure, but do not help businesses understand the detail.

They may ignore:

· Staff travel

· Visitor travel

· The difference between transport methods

· The impact of logistics and freight

· Life cycle assessments of materials

· Stand size and design

· Reuse rates

· Labour and social value

Green Circle Solutions Africa has been created to fill that gap.

Its dashboards and calculators have been developed specifically for the realities of events, exhibitions and visitor environments.

That means a client can understand not only the footprint of an event or exhibition stand, but what is driving it.

For example:

· How much of the footprint comes from staff travel?

· Would changing from one truck size to another make a difference?

· Does using a reused stand create a lower carbon footprint and a better financial outcome?

· How much carbon is linked to visitor travel?

· Which choices create the best balance between environmental impact, cost and social benefit?

This is particularly relevant for sectors such as wine tourism, where visitor travel can account for a large proportion of overall emissions.

A winery may discover that the environmental impact of guests travelling to an event is greater than the footprint of the event itself. That information can then be used to make better decisions, communicate more clearly and create a stronger business case for action.

Why the Business Case Matters

One of the biggest myths Gary wants to challenge is the idea that sustainability automatically costs more.

“There is still a perception that green means expensive,” he says. “That might have been true years ago in some cases, but it is not true now.”

He points to solar panels as an example. Historically, they were often too expensive for many businesses to justify. Today, costs have reduced significantly and the return on investment is much clearer.

The same applies to many sustainability decisions in events and exhibitions.

Reusing materials, reducing transport, improving logistics and designing stands more efficiently can all reduce costs.

They can also improve working conditions.

Gary gives the example of more efficient stand construction. If a stand can be built in a smarter way, requiring fewer overnight shifts and fewer extreme hours, it improves the lives of the people building it.

That matters because ESG is not just about carbon.

It is also about people.

In South Africa, where labour, skills shortages and employment are major issues, the “S” in ESG is often just as important as the “E”.

Local manufacturing, reuse chains and smarter design all create jobs.

Green Circle Solutions Africa proposition is deliberately broader than carbon reporting alone.

The company will help clients understand:

· Environmental impact

· Social impact

· Labour and workforce issues

· Financial performance

· Practical opportunities for improvement

Starting With Benchmarking, Not Perfection

Another important difference in the GCS Africa approach is that it does not start with unrealistic targets.

Too often, businesses are made to feel that if they are not already scoring 90%, they have failed.

Gary believes that is the wrong starting point.

The first step is benchmarking.

Understanding where you are today. Identifying what you are already doing well. Highlighting the areas that matter most. Then setting achievable targets that fit the reality of the business.

Some companies may discover they are already making better choices than they realised. Others may find that assumptions they have made about being “green” do not stand up to scrutiny.

Both are useful.

Because without an honest baseline, it is impossible to improve.

That benchmarking process will then be supported by training, helping clients understand not just what to change, but why it matters.

Who GCS Africa Will Work With

The first focus will be on sectors where pressure for ESG reporting is already growing.

These include:

· Financial services

· Healthcare and medical businesses

· Sporting goods and sports-related organisations

· Events, exhibitions and experiential marketing

· Visitor attractions and tourism

· Wine and hospitality businesses

Financial services are expected to be one of the earliest growth areas because they are already highly governed and increasingly concerned about both direct and indirect environmental impact.

At the same time, large corporate clients are often asking more of their agencies and suppliers.

Gary has noticed that while agencies themselves may not always be focused on their own footprint, the brands and corporate clients they work for increasingly are.

That creates a growing opportunity for better, more specific measurement.

Building a Local Business With Global Strength

Green Circle Solutions Africa will operate as its own business, local leadership and a distinctly African voice. At the same time, the company will benefit from the wider Green Circle Solutions brand, tools and international experience.

South African businesses often look to Europe and the UK for proven ideas and recognised brands, explained Gary. By combining international expertise with local knowledge, GCS Africa aims to offer something different: sustainability support that is credible, practical and rooted in the realities of Africa.