Le Blogue Vert de Nature

Nouveau venu dans la blogosphère au Québec : Le Blogue Vert de Nature. C’est un blogue lancé par Cascades. L'innovation, le développement durable et la grande famille Cascades sont au coeur des discussions.

Le blogue Vert de Nature constitue le cœur du dialogue que Cascades souhaite établir dans les médias sociaux. La communauté virtuelle y est invitée pour échanger sur les nombreuses initiatives de l’entreprise en matière de développement durable et découvrir les possibilités d’emploi au sein de la grande famille Cascades.

Greening Fast Food Packaging: A Roadmap to Best Practices

Today, Dogwood Alliance released “Greening Fast Food Packaging: A Roadmap to Best Practices,” which outlines eight key attributes of environmentally friendly fast food packaging, and provides simple guidance on how to assess environmental impacts in the supply chain. The report highlights leaders in the fast food industry that have undertaken key initiatives that will help move the entire sector forward. Also included is a valuable action plan to focus corporate sustainability efforts.

The Dogwood Alliance's eight step to making packaging more environmentally friendly include:

1. Embrace corporate leadership on sustainability: Adopt an environmental packaging policy and get buy-in from leadership.
2. Use a full life cycle and supply chain approach: Determine the complete scope of impacts from packaging along the entire supply chain.
3. Reduce overall packaging and increase efficiency: Minimize packaging, make it lighter.
4. Increase use of recycled fiber
5. Eliminate paper from controversial forestry practices (with this step, Dogwood Alliance wades into the ongoing debate on sustainable forestry, urging companies should use only paper certified by the Forest Stewardship Council and avoid paper certified by the Sustainable Forestry Initiative.)
6. Increase in-store recycling and recovery: Provide recycling within restaurants and encourage recycling when customers take packaging away.
7. Eliminate toxic inks and labels.
8. Reduce carbon footprint: Make transportation more efficient through better shipping setups and fuel-efficient vehicles.

Peut-on survivre sans emballage?

Vous trouvez Ci-dessous la présentation que j’ai donnée la semaine dernière dans le cadre des 48 heures de la communication pour le développement durable (Eastman, 16 et 17 février 2012)

Peut-on survivre sans emballage?

Peut-on survivre sans emballage?

Je serai ce vendredi sur le panel thématique: Communication visuelle responsable pour échanger sur l’emballage et le suremballage.

Au lieu de parler de zéro emballage, il serait plus adéquat de parler de Lutte contre le suremballage; un phénomène qui coûte cher au fabricant et suscite des réactions du client. L'emballage est un bien nécessaire plutôt qu'un mal. Il joue un rôle majeur dans la protection et la conservation des aliments en garantissant la sécurité alimentaire. Il constitue aussi un atout majeur dans la réduction des pertes de produits périssables.

Voici le plan de ma présentation :

1. Emballage: outil technique et marketing
2. Emballage et suremballage
3. Emballage et éco-conception
4. Emballages et plastiques biodégradables
5. Emballages éco-conçus
6. Conclusions

 Au plaisir de vous rencontrer et d’échanger avec vous!

Tesco trials new packaging to reduce food waste

Tesco is the latest supermarket to trial new packaging that will keep fruit and vegetables fresher, in a bid to reduce food waste.

It will become the first retailer to see how the packaging performs in prolonging the freshness of tomatoes and avocados – produce that triggers the highest wastage in the food industry. Tesco estimates the new packaging could lead to a potential saving of 1.6m packs of tomatoes and 350,000 packs of avocados every year. If successful, it could be rolled out across 80% of the varieties of tomato it sells.

The packaging contains a strip that absorbs ethylene, the hormone that causes fruit to ripen and then turn mouldy. The strip was developed in the UK by It's Fresh Ltd, which says it is 100 times more effective than any similar existing materials.

Read more…

L'emballage alimentaire... de passif à actif

Depuis une dizaine d’années, les efforts de recherche et d’innovation dans le domaine de l’emballage alimentaire ont essentiellement porté sur les matériaux barrière (nouveaux polymères, matériaux complexes, matériaux nanostructurés, etc.), ainsi que sur l’optimisation des emballages. Une nouvelle génération d’emballages émerge aujourd’hui en affichant des propriétés tout à fait originales, qui s’écartent des deux grandes caractéristiques de l’emballage, que sont la protection de l’aliment par effet barrière (vis-à-vis des gaz, de la vapeur d’eau, des micro-organismes, des chocs, etc.) et l’inertie de l’emballage vis-à-vis de l’aliment (pas de migration de constituants de l’emballage vers l’aliment). Ces nouvelles techniques d’emballage permettent de ralentir considérablement le processus de dégradation, tout en améliorant le contrôle de la fraîcheur. Les emballages actifs entrent en interaction avec l’aliment ou s’adaptent à son environnement pour préserver, le plus longtemps possible, et de façon optimale, ses qualités organoleptiques et nutritionnelles.

Ce numéro de BioTendance® (Cliquez ici) offre un panorama des plus récentes applications des emballages actifs dans le secteur de l’emballage alimentaire. Les enjeux et les cadres réglementaires seront aussi évoqués.

Sommaire :

1.    Introduction

2.    Emballage alimentaire : de passif à actif

2.1 Définition

2.2 Marchés et tendances

3.    Emballages actifs : des systèmes et fonctionnalités variés

4.    Applications des emballages actifs : au-delà de l’effet barrière

            4.1 Les absorbeurs d’oxygène

4.2 Les émetteurs d’éthanol

4.3 Les agents antimicrobiens

4.4 Nanomatériaux antimicrobiens

4.5 Les films à perméabilité sélective (contrôlée)

4.6 Emballage sous atmosphère modifiée (MAP)

5.    Enjeux et défis industriels

6.    Cadres réglementaires (Europe et Amérique du Nord)

7.    Conclusion et perspectives

8.    Références

Global packaging industry expected to reach $820 billion by 2016

The global packaging industry will swell to almost $820 billion by 2016 predicts Pira International in a new market forecast. Driven mainly by increasing demand for packaging in emerging and transitional economies, a 3% per annum growth rate will focus on board products and rigid plastics, with $40 billion and $33 billion in cumulative predicted growth respectively to 2016.

This growth is being driven by a number of broad trends such as growing urbanisation, investment in housing and construction, a burgeoning healthcare sector and the rapid development still evident in the emerging economies, including China, India, Brazil and some eastern European countries. An increase in personal disposable income in the developing regions fuels consumption across a broad range of products, with consequential growth in demand for the packaging of these goods. For instance, increased demand for white goods, like washing machines and dishwashers, driven also by growing time pressure on consumer lifestyles, leads not just to a growing demand for packaging for the machines themselves, but also for associated products such as the household care products needed to operate these machines, thus stimulating demand across a range of packaging media.

More specifically, robust growth in demand for rigid plastic packaging, especially in sectors like drinks, cosmetics, toiletries, and household and personal care products, is stimulating packaging consumption. Similarly, flexible plastic packaging materials are receiving a boost from sectors like perishable foods, healthcare, convenience foods and various industrial markets. Corrugated board consumption is being egged on by the processed food sector and a number of non-food applications including personal and household care, chemicals, electrical goods and others. At the same time, folding carton consumption is benefiting from the growth found in healthcare products, electrical goods, and frozen and chilled foods, among others.

According to the Pira, the US was the largest consumer for packaging in 2010 with a demand of $137 billion; China was close behind at $80 billion. China is anticipated to surpass the US by 2017, and India will enter the top ten packaging countries with its demand set to almost double in the next five years to $24 billion.

Technological developments in packaging are seeing an upswing in the consumption of bio-polymers in both rigid and flexible applications, improved value adding in products with functional and barrier coatings, as well as enhanced graphics, resource reduction by way of continuous lightweighting across all materials, and other developments.

Board products account for the biggest sector of the packaging market, totaling some $210 billion in 2010 and maintaining their leading position into 2016 when the sector will be worth $40 billion more at nearly $250 billion.

Pira research shows that food and healthcare packaging will continue to be the biggest end uses in global packaging, with the food and drinks industry growing by almost $43 billion combined to 2016. The study shows that health care packs will grow 4.5% each year to reach a total of $34 billion. Cosmetics packaging should grow 4.2% per year to reach $24 billion.

Source

Fully recyclable packaging – good green cred or unsustainable smokescreen?

Recyclable products are key to a sustainable business model but companies must go further to be considered truly green. Frances Cook looks at whether packaging companies hide behind a 'fully recyclable' slogan and asks, what must be done to create a more sustainable product life cycle?

All look and no substance?

Consumers' perceptions can be created by all manner of factors, but one of the greatest influencers in packaging is the design - the way the product looks and feels.

"Printing a recyclable device or message is very prevalent in most first world countries now but there are subtle differences and there is sometimes a tendency to play this up with brands from S-MEs more than multinationals" said Andrew Streeter of Pack-Track, a Datamonitor packaging research service and packaging expert.

"People are beginning to using words like fully recyclable and probably stretching the point. It is not used as a smokescreen as such, but more as a marketing claim - it is opportunistic," he added.

"There is a trend of sustainability and greenness which some companies are taking advantage of. I hold the view that packaging in some regions is taking on a consumer perceived 'greenish' persona. Matt inks have enjoyed a renaissance, surface texturing, plastics can look very paper like and there are more board applications.

"They are trying to fulfil a consumer need, that recyclable, green element in the brand values. Perhaps there is a hidden or more covert approach to this development, it also conveys a quality dynamic in the brand."

Readmore…

Why haven’t bioplastics captured a larger market share?

Market expectations for bioplastic usage were initially hyped as this wonderful technology that would replace traditional plastics in all applications.  Some predictions say they will replace 20% of all plastics. Who were the proponents of these lofty predictions kidding?  They certainly were not uttered by people with knowledge of market development realities or experience in the plastic industry.  So why haven’t bioplastics captured a larger market share than their reported 1-2% of total plastic usage?  There are four reasons: 

1. Performance is not matched to brand owner or consumer expectations;
2. Time-line to market acceptance not realistic;
3. Bioplastic companies marketing efforts not given enough field support and
4. Difficulties selling to an uninformed customer base and an uninformed end-user base. 

Read more…

Consumers believe products are over-packaged

Three-quarters of Americans believe many consumer products are over-packaged, according to a survey of lifestyle of health and sustainability (LOHAS) consumers conducted by the Natural Marketing Institute (NMI), Harleysville, Pa. Minimal packaging is most preferred among consumers, followed by recyclable packaging and use of environmentally friendly packaging materials.

“The ‘less is more’ trend continues to resonate with consumers,” said Steve French, managing partner of NMI, in a statement. “Marketers can maintain current and attract new consumers by using less packaging and ‘greener’ packaging materials. Specifically, ‘renewable’ and ‘plant-based’ materials are rated most environmentally friendly among consumers.”

The survey results reveal that consumers show an increasing adoption of new — and easily executed — behaviors that can save the planet, the institute said. NMI recommends that businesses promote the use of post-consumer recycled packaging as well as incorporate new environmentally sourced materials where applicable, but it cautions that companies should not choose packaging that will affect the expense of the product or the consumer’s experience with it.

Source