Rural areas are exposed to severe environmental pollution issues fed by industrial and agricultural activities combined with poor waste and sanitation management practices, struggling to achieve the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in line with Agenda 2030. Rural communities are examined through a “dual approach” as both contributors and receivers of plastic pollution leakage into the natural environment (through the air–water–soil–biota nexus). Despite the emerging trend of plastic pollution research, in this paper, we identify few studies investigating rural communities. Therefore, proxy analysis of peer-reviewed literature is required to outline the significant gaps related to plastic pollution and plastic waste management issues in rural regions. This work focuses on key stages such as (i) plastic pollution effects on rural communities, (ii) plastic pollution generated by rural communities, (iii) the development of a rural waste management sector in low- and middle-income countries in line with the SDGs, and (iv) circular economy opportunities to reduce plastic pollution in rural areas. We conclude that rural communities must be involved in both future plastic pollution and circular economy research to help decision makers reduce environmental and public health threats, and to catalyze circular initiatives in rural areas around the world, including less developed communities.

The imperative to make energy and resource consumption more sustainable is prompting a critical reconsideration of all human endeavours. Within urban water management, the drive to enhance sustainability is grounded in the recognition that water services consume a substantial amount of energy and that wastewater contains valuable resources, including water, heat, organic matter and essential plant nutrients. To make urban water systems more sustainable, a paradigm shift is needed. Among the proposed strategies, source separation coupled with anaerobic co-digestion appears to be an effective means of recovering energy, water and nutrients. Here, as existing centralized infrastructure that serves tens to hundreds of thousands of people is difficult to alter and the technologies needed to realize this strategy are difficult to implement in single-family homes, we consider the scale of a city block. Using a quantitative model of unit processes that simulate energy, water and nutrient flows, we consider the technical and economic feasibility of a representative decentralized system, as well as its environmental impacts. To realize potential synergies associated with on-site use of the recovered resources, we complement the decentralized water system with vertical farming, photovoltaic energy generation and rainwater harvesting. Our analysis suggests that decentralized water systems can serve as a cornerstone of efforts to enhance resource efficiency and improve the resilience of cities.