Speaking exclusively to Packaging News, SCA Recycling UK business development director Simon Barnes said that ‘rightweighting’ (lightweighting) is the key to good design.
He said an example of bad packaging would be a pack that used multi-materials and was hard to recycle.
However, Barnes stressed that “first of all, the packaging has to protect the product and also provide a marketing function”.
Good design vs. bad design
He added: “We recently had a discussion with local authorities and we looked at a number of different products. And what becomes clear even within the same category of product, be it snacks, crisp, bread, or pet food, there are some examples of good design of packaging and bad design.
“How can we reward good design for recovery and resource use? Is there need for a fiscal incentive? Ultimately, is there a need for a variable VAT rate to reward good design and punish poor design?
“We have seen the success of the landfill tax as a fiscal incentive and can we use fiscal incentives elsewhere to drive sustainability?”
Barnes said a fair system would be to tax the owner of the product for bad design. He said: “If they were taxed they will hopefully instruct their packaging designers and manufacturers to improve their design.
“The challenge will be in terms of measuring what good design is in an equitable way.
“One of the quotes I always come up with is from Lord Kelvin who said that ‘you cannot manage what you cannot measure’.”
Barnes also said that packaging designers need to talk more within their own businesses to other category managers to see “what has worked and what has not”.
Different messages within the same brand
Barnes explained: “We recently did a workshop and picked up packaging in a number of different categories.
“We found that even with products that are owned by the same owner, if we look at Nestlé for example who make confectionery as well as pet food, there appears to be quite different things going on within those two categories.
“Confectionery has clear labelling [sustainability] and clear objectives but within pet food maybe not the same strength. I think that this is a lost opportunity within Nestlé that provides good leadership.
“It needs to ensure that leadership is across all of its brands and its products.
“I admire what they do. However, I wonder if they sit round the table and talk about sustainability across all their different brands in all the different countries that they are based in? And if they don’t what are the challenges to doing that? Sustainability leadership needs to come from the top.”
Nestlé’s response
A Nestlé spokesman told PN: “Nestlé carefully considers the environmental impact of packaging as an integral part of its product design. Since the early 1990s, we have been reducing the amount of packaging we use through our global source reduction programme – eliminating unnecessary packaging and reducing weight while ensuring product quality.
“In 2009, Nestlé UK & Ireland became the first major confectionery manufacturer to replace non-recyclable plastic with recyclable cardboard packaging in 20 million Easter eggs, 80% of the 25 million that we made that year. In 2010 we introduced cardboard trays to many of our large Easter eggs, replacing plastic inserts and reducing their use in a further 10% of production.
“In May 2011, Nestlé Purina launched “Together We Can” an initiative to encourage Felix and Winalot purchasers to recycle more pet food cans.”
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The call to tax bad packaging may seem seductive but who should judge and on what basis? I do agree that the minimum amount of packaging should be used for purpose but packaging design involves considering a multitude of inputs – cost, processing, marketing, environmental impact, recyclability …etc. The weighting each company puts on each aspect will be different. So who is to judge what’s good or bad? Recovery should be an important aspect in packaging design, but making every piece of packaging readily recyclable may not provide the lowest environental impact in all cases and multi material packaging has an important role to play.
If government wants to force designers and industry down a given route, then legislation can be used. But let’s be clear the decision would be political and have nothing to do with ‘good’ or ‘bad’ packaging.
I do agree with most of the comments. Let us not forget that food waste is by far the bad party and more sophisticated packaging e.g. Multilaminates can help to overcome this. We must also consider that we are a global society and imports arrive all the time in packs that we may consider bad. To monitor and agree what is good or bad design would be a vast proposition which no one person or group should control. As for sustainability this has a different definition depending on the country and the section of the total supply chain. What we could do is bring back an analytical team of experts who could advise on various packs considered by the public to be bad for one reason or another. Whilst light weighting is commendable in many ways it can never be the answer to all the problems. Alternative materials or more efficient packing lines are two ways to look forward and maybe aid the environment.
I fully agree with Dr. Anderson – it may be quite difficult if not invalid to judge packs on a weight/readily recyclable basis which seems a really quite crude approach. The availability of waste management infrastructure varies widely across the country /EU and one needs to consider things from a life cycle perspective. For example, refill pouch packs for freeze dried coffee using multi-layer barrier plastic film, although not readily recyclable, save significant amounts of fossil fuel derived energy and emissions compared with readily recyclable glass container packaging-distribution and recyclate collection systems. Also, the multi-layer plastic film may be sent for waste-to-energy recovery or, potentially, can be recycled through pyrolysis or other processes. However, I do feel that far more attention and environmentally responsible consideration needs to be paid by brand owners and pack designers to optimise the design of their packaging-distribution systems and make packs more readily recyclable or recoverable in some closed loop way e.g. more readily recycled clear or light blue plastic PET drinks bottles rather than coloured ones for which there is a limited market demand – refer Design for Recycling Guidelines for PET bottles http://www.petbottleplatform.eu/design_guidelines.php. This area of responsibility also extends to brand owners marketing packs in developing countries where there may exist little or no waste management infrastructure. A tax on materials, such as laminates/ co-extruded plastics, would probably favour the use of heavier packaging materials like glass and metals thereby creating more environmental impact and incurring more cost. However, it would no doubt generate more business for corrugated packaging suppliers and recyclers.
Might I suggest that the article is redundant. Legislation already exists. The Packaging & Packaging Waste Directive plus the Valpak scheme already sufficiently control packaging design. Changes to central guidance and restructuring of fees could easily achieve the drive to better packaging.
One aspect that would be easy to monitor is to limit food packaging to only one layer of plastic per item from shipping to sales.
At the moment we have plastic bottles, encased in a plastic shrink wrap in a 12 pack carton or similar. Then these are packed on a pallet for shipping and the pallet is then wrapped in plastic shrink wrap again to hold the cartons in place. This is just too much plastic and it is making for large disposal issues. Manufacturers can go back to cardboard cartons and nets for palletising. All reusable and recyclable. And easy to monitor.