Biopac, a UK bio-based and sustainable packaging design and manufacturing company, has joined the ISA-Pack international consortium to take a leading role in developing packaging that will help fight food spoilage.
With a €3 million ($3.7 million) grant from the European Commission, ISA-Pack has begun a three-year project to develop fully sustainable packaging for perishable food. According to estimates, food and beverages represent more than 70 percent of the global packaging market, which has an annual growth rate of more than 4 percent. The ISA-Pack project seeks to reduce retailer supply chain waste of fresh food by 75 percent.
In addition to extending the shelf life and improving the quality of fresh foods, the new packaging will be designed to reduce packaging waste. ISA-Pack will invite food processors, retailers, and consumers to help shape the program.
The ISA-Pack international consortium is developing innovative, sustainabale packaging films that it says will help reduce food spoilage and packaging waste. (Source: Biopac)
"The opportunity to combine the use of sustainable materials and create significant supply chain benefits in extending shelf life is a major leap forward in fresh food packaging," Biopac director Mark Brigden said in a press release.
Biopac makes food service biodegradable and recycled packaging and cleaning products, bioplastic medical disposables, and compostable mulches, films, and pots for gardeners and plant nurseries. The materials it uses include corn starch, potato starch from waste potatoes, FDA-certified recycled post-consumer waste, wild bulrush, naturally shed palm leaf sheath, sugarcane waste, and sustainably harvested wood.
We've reported before on demonstrations of compostable packaging by manufacturers such as BASF. These products include a prototype snack bag and flexible, biodegradable film used as a mulch in agriculture.
The ISA-Pack project's main goal is to develop PHB (polyhydroxybutyrate) copolymer stretch films and HB (hydroxybutyrate) copolymer MAP (modified atmosphere packaging) gas barrier sheets and films from sustainable feedstocks. In addition, ISA-Pack wants to develop an accurate, tunable, and reliable intelligent indicator system that can be printed on to packaging materials. The system will combine integrated time/temperature indicators for monitoring bacterial growth with food freshness indicators.
The consortium plans to validate its results within industrial packaging production processes, and it will undertake a full life cycle and economic assessment of the products developed through the project. The ISA-Pack research and development program is being funded by the European Commission's 7th Framework Programme, which combines research and development efforts from five countries.
I think the return on investment might be more evident when considering the cost of "spoilage"relative to the cost of the biopackage itself. I could be wrong here but it seems that could "win the day" for the manufacturer. I don't really know that much about retail food distribution but surely the cost of "off-quality" is considerable and those articles of food that simply cannot be used is a factor when considering the package itself.
Thanks for the input. I know there isn't much in the way of consumer protection laws in many other nations. My main point, though, isn't just about protecting the consumer: it's equally about the presence or absence of a "we're all in this together" mentality, instead of an "everyone-for-him/herself" mentality. In this case, the "this" we're all in together, regardless of the specific community or region, is trying to make large infrastructure changes towards the goal of sustainability. Focusing on minimizing expense and maximizing profit, at the expense of all other goals, will not get us there.
Ann, thanks for sharing your concerns. But everybody wants to minimize their expense and maximize the profit. In such a situation only the customer has to sacrifice or spent out more. Obliviously I know, forcing the customer to shell out for any service won't help in business. Here there is no such rules/laws to protect consumer rights or privileges.
Mydesign, I understand the businesses' POV and argument quite well. But I think their attitude of charging what the market will bear--they'll have sales whether they charge for packing or not--is irresponsible and does not help the overall effort. It also shifts the burden to consumers instead of the business as a cost of doing business. The fact that the cost is "only a few cents" is a standard, if somewhat facile, argument for shifting costs to users. If it's considered a normal cost of doing business, then it will become integrated more quickly into the infrastructure's normal way of doing things on the larger scale, included as standard business costs like paying for phone, utilities, and garbage services. That not-a-good-corporate-citizen attitude doesn't work where I live: here, that restaurant would not do well and might even go out of business, or a law would be passed to prevent restaurants from doing that (I believe it already has).
Ann, from business point of view they know, sales may go well irrespective of whether they are charging for packing or not. So they don't want to bear the extra expenses for packing and passing the same to the customers. Its only very minimal and equallent to 10-20 cents.
Mydesign, thanks for the additional info about your situation. I'm sorry to hear about the charges: I think they're pretty outrageous. I live in a county where similar laws have been passed about takeout food containers and plastic bags. But here, the "extra burden" is considered a cost of doing business and good citizenship on the part of the businesses. The only extra charge is for paper bags at one grocery store, but they do offer free cardboard containers instead, as a form of recycling. At least in my area, no one would put up with attempting to charge extra for takeout containers.
Ann, am residing at one of the developing nation in Asia. 02 year back only they have started charging for packing due to strict government rules. Government has passed a bill that, for packing they have to use high quality food grade materials and this brings extra burden to hotels and restaurants. So they started collecting packing cost for take away items.
Green packaging is a great solution to help reduce littering and our carbon footprint. As a sales rep. at Peek Packaging, I see people who want to use more eco-friendly packaging all the time. However, the problem is that when they see how expensive green packaging is compared to standard Packaging design, they tend to move away from green packaging. If we can find ways to make eco friendly packaging cheaper, more people will move in that direction. Check us out at www.peekpackaging.com
Mydesign, I don't know where you live, but no restaurants near me are charging for packing up my leftovers just because my county has passed a law requiring sustainable takeout packaging. That's pretty outrageous. Perhaps you can get a town or county ordinance passed to change that.
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