Page 20 - Packaging News Magazine July-August 2018

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SHOW WRAP
HISPACK 2018 www.packagingnews.com.au
July-August 2018
The scene is set for networking and sharing information to keep Spanish product development, production and logistics on track in a challenging business climate.
Spanish steps forward
There was much to learn at Hispack 2018 about the packaging trends impacting Spain’s food and drink exporters. This key trade show for the region captured the growing acceptance of working with robots and the rising tide of environmental mindfulness. Joanne Hunter reports for PKN.
glugging. The product was devel- oped at the Canadian factory and is also in production in France.
WONDERS OF WOOD
Ingrained into Spain’s culture is wood, the go-to material for its utili- ty in functional products and its aes- thetic qualities in decorative fea- tures. For inspiration there is none better than Gaudi’s domestic interi- ors that display woodcraft taken to creative extremes.
Found in the show aisles was evi- dence of wood’s potential in indus- trial applications, ranging from pal- lets and crates, to finely milled parts for high-end primary packaging in the beauty sector.
WELL-TIMED Hispack 2018, held from 8-11 May at Fira de Barce- lona, pulled together an inter- national network of customers and suppliers, key informa- tion on compliance, science and technology, headline trends and other insights to help keep product development, production and logistics on track for the region’s mainly small and medi- um-sized companies, including ex- porters of fresh and processed foods. The business climate has brought growing acceptance of working with and around robots, and suppliers were out in force. Elsewhere in the halls producers and distributors proposed grass, sugar cane and palm fibre as naturally-based options for foodservice and retail, compatible with a rising tide of environmental
mindfulness.
Smurfit Kappa targeted local sta-
ple markets of orange juice and olive oil with its bag-in-box technology and introduced an adapted version tailored to motor oils which was brought to market in 2017 by Den
Hertog, of the Netherlands. Exxon Mobil, Esso, Chevron and Castrol among others have since been won over by the offered benefits. These include a smaller plastics compo- nent compared with existing sys- tems that cuts disposal costs, better protection from counterfeiting and easy to dispense into a reusable rigid plastics container. Nylon gives the bag strength and chemical resis- tance and a 1.5cm diameter tap spout delivers maximum flow without