Page 22 - Print 21 Magazine Jul-Aug 2020

Sustainability
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consume less energy without compromising print quality.
Setting a green procurement framework for raw materials, parts, and products ensures Ricoh works with suppliers who meet strict standards and help reduce the environmental impact of its products.
The company is continuing to work to reduce environmentally sensitive substances used in its products
and has established a chemical management system to comply with the Reach regulatory framework.
Ricoh developed the Rico2Ret system to minimise the environmental impact of its products. The system identifies processes with high CO2 emissions and shows how to reduce them. For example, the company developed
a tin-free, low temperature fixing eco-toner with less environmental impact in the production process called PxP toner. By fusing at lower temperatures, the PxP devices consume less energy without compromising print quality.
Environmental
Fuji Xerox
The Versant Series and Iridesse Production Press are part of the Fuji Xerox Environmentally Conscious Products and Services Program.
These two production machines have the Fujifilm Group Green Value Products certification, given to environmentally conscious products and services that are “excellent in reducing environmental impact”.
The Green Value Products certification programme is for products and services that reduce environmental impact throughout their life cycle, from acquisition of raw materials, production, usage, disposition, all the way through reuse.
The Versant 180 and Versant 3100 Press Series, as well as the Iridesse Production Press, hold a Silver level of contribution to the reduction of environmental impact.
The Silver level indicates
products and services that reduce environmental impact at their respective industries’ standard level or greater. It ensures requirements of major environment labels for energy consumption, hazardous substances, audible sound level during operation, and recyclable design are satisfied.
It is not just the presses themselves though that Fuji Xerox is working on, its head office and five other sites have been certified ISO 14001:2015 Environmental Management System by SAI Global for Environmental Management System (EMS). The certification covers the sale, distribution, installation, training, service support, and maintenance for business machines; the collection and recycling of equipment
and related spare parts and consumables; the design and remanufacture of business machine parts and sub-assemblies; the sale and support of software solutions; and the provision of document management services.
The company has also won
a Banksia Award, Leading in Sustainability – Setting the Standard for Large Organisations. The judges commented: “Through a commitment to reducing the impact of their products and customers’ footprint, as well as their total approach to product innovation
and supply chain management
the judges understood that Fuji Xerox is an example of a highly evolved and integrated approach to sustainability.” 21
22 Print21 JULY/AUGUST 2020
Consumers look
to packaging with
sustainable edge
For so long the undisputed king of packaging, plastic, is now a tarnished product in the eyes of the consumer at least. This thanks to images beaming into the nation’s living rooms through their TV screens of oceans seemingly littered with the stuff and the realisation that the plastic we all thought was being recycled was in fact just being dumped in poor countries, with the brands turning a blind eye to it.
Now the move is on to develop fibre-based packaging, and that spells good news for commercial printers. Surveys reveal that consumers want fibre packaging and are willing to pay more for it as society wakes up to its environmental responsibilities.
According to the 2019 Paper
& Packaging Consumer Trends Report from paper giant Asia Pulp & Paper, more than half of Americans, 53 per cent, claim that environmental sustainability is
a significant factor when making any kind of purchasing decision.
Some 61 per cent say they would be prepared to pay more for food products packed in sustainable materials, and one in three claim they would pay 10 per cent more for this.
The US study also revealed that the appeal of sustainability is important in retail goods office goods, and luxury goods, which all recorded near 50 per cent figures in numbers of people looking for fibre-based products.
Consumers said they want the brands to provide more sustainable products, with the caveat that they will switch to brands that place a high value on sustainability as consumers themselves increasingly adopt more sustainable lifestyles.
The findings in the US are mirrored by research carried out for ProCarton and the German fibre-board packaging association, looking at the correlation between organic products and cardboard packaging, and will be reflected in Australia and New Zealand.