Kyra Chisholm (she/her) is a Master’s of Geography student in the SPROUT (Sustainable Policy Research on Urban Transitions) Lab at the University of Waterloo. Kyra is interested in understanding the pathways that SMEs follow in transitioning to a more circular economy and the organizations and institutional enablers and barriers that they experience along the way. She is also looking to examine the ways in which the principles of the circular economy contribute to increased resilience for SMEs, such as geographically shorter and more stable supply chains, building adaptive capacity within the organization, etc.
On the TRANSFORM project Kyra is a member of the Rapid Research Team that is working to understand how deeply sustainable enterprises contribute to community resilience (for more about the work of the Rapid Research Team, check out Rapid Research on Community Resilience & SMEs: Post-COVID-19 Sustainability article). She has contributed evidence of sustainable SMEs across Canada whose operations contribute to aspects of increased community resilience. Additionally, she has contributed to writing some of the content of a forthcoming policy brief, and in the coming months Kyra will contribute to a peer-reviewed paper alongside the members of the Rapid Research Team.
Kyra’s Master’s thesis will apply the TRANSFORM case study methods to co-create case studies with 3-4 SMEs that have circular business models. The case studies are intended to demonstrate how the principles of the circular economy can be implemented by SMEs in pursuit of a sustainable transformation.