Food Industry Continues Move to Sustainable Packaging

The food and beverage industry including processors, packagers and tableware manufacturers continues to deliver a greater number of sustainable products to meet growing demand from environmentally-conscious consumers and retailers to lower the environmental impact of their packaging.

According to a recent Datamonitor survey, consumers are starting to make their buying decisions based on concerns about excessive packaging.

As one recent example, Bumble Bee Foods LLC introduced its first 100 percent biodegradable packaging for multipacking its 5-oz cans of Prime Fillet Atlantic Salmon, reports Greener Packaging. The four-pack cans are packaged together by shrink-sleeve labeling supplied and printed by Printpack, Inc., which are manufactured from Earthfirst PLA plant-based, biodegradable, compostable film from Plastic Suppliers, according to the article.

In addition, the 5-oz steel cans, from multiple suppliers, are 100 percent recyclable, and the sustainable packaging gives the multipacks an upscale look on the store shelf and provides excellent printability, according to Greener Packaging.

In its efforts to become more environmentally friendly, Sutter Home Winery is now using PET bottles from Ball Corp. for all of its 187-mL wine bottles sold in the U.S., reports Greener Packaging. The bottles feature Plasmax, a transparent, internal silicon oxide (SiOx) barrier-coating technology from KHS Plasmax GmbH that protects the wine inside the bottle, while providing exceptional clarity, according to the news site.

A recycling study conducted according to the European Petcore protocols demonstrated that Plasmax is removable during the recycling process and does not negatively affect any of the test requirements, reports Greener Packaging.

The article also notes that the results were shared with the Association of Postconsumer Plastic Recyclers (APR), the trade industry representing more than 90 percent of the post-consumer plastic processing capacity in North America, and it raised no objections to the results.

Sutter Home Winery said in the article that the PET bottles generates 60 percent fewer greenhouse gasses than producing the glass bottles and the PET bottles allow the company to use less fuel and gain supply-chain efficiencies because it can get more bottles on a pallet and on a truck.

Be Green Packaging, LLC (Be Green) recently announced that its line of tree-free compostable bulrush food packaging for food and industrial packaging industries has been re-certified “Silver” Cradle to Cradle by environmental consulting firm McDonough Braungart Design Chemistry, LLC (MBDC).

The company said the bulrush packaging continues to meet the certification criteria for materials, material reutilization/design for environment, energy, water and social responsibility. To achieve re-certification, Be Green had to develop a strategy to improve its product’s chances of achieving a closed loop life cycle.