Page 16 - Food & Drink Magazine October 2019

COVER STORY
Brownes leads
A partnership between Brownes Dairy and Tetra Pak means the Australian dairy icon will be the first Australian company to use a fully
FROM mid-October, Australia’s oldest dairy company, Brownes Dairy is set to complete an Australian first. In partnership with Tetra Pak, the 130-year-old organisation will be the first to integrate the fully renewable and recyclable Tetra Rex Bio-Based cartons across its entire milk carton range.
The carton is a world first, made entirely from plant-based, renewable materials. The first layer is paperboard made with wood fibres sourced from Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certified forests and other controlled sources.
Next, two protective layers, derived from sugarcane, line either side of the paperboard.
It is the use of plant-based material in the protective layers that makes this package so different from other formats.
In Europe, Tetra Pak has delivered more than half a billion
Brownes CEO Tony Girgis says: “We scoured the planet in search of the best sustainable packaging on the market. Making the switch to a package that utilises sugarcane and paper as feedstock is not only better for the environment, but now our consumers can trust the package is made from renewable, plant-based materials.”
Tetra Pak Oceania MD Andrew Pooch says: “Bio-based means it is derived from plants which is a renewable resource. Renewable means that the source of packaging material is replenished, where more plants are grown than what is required to produce this packaging.
“The other benefit to renewable resources is that it has a lower carbon footprint than fossil-based plastic, which means this packaging has a much lower impact to climate change.”
usual mindset to realising it could do something remarkable.
“We went from being active when it came to sustainability to becoming an industry leader, and that has had a flow through effect through the whole company culture – all areas of the business now look at what they can do in small ways.”
For Brownes and Tetra Pak
16 | Food&Drink business | October 2019 | www.foodanddrinkbusiness.com.au
of these cartons since it first introduced the bio-based package into the dairy sector with Finnish brand Valio in 2015.
Back in the south-west region of Western Australia, Brownes collects approximately 150 million litres of milk a year from more than 50 dairies.
It has a diverse portfolio, including milk, yoghurt, flavoured milk, juice and desserts and has enviable consumer brand loyalty in its market.
Brownes has announced it will switch 25 products – more than 17.8 million milk cartons per year – to the new fully renewable packaging format.
TAKING THE LEAD, RAISING AWARENESS When Food & Drink Business caught up with Brownes’ senior marketing manager Nicole Ohm, she said it had been something the companies had been working on for some time.
Tetra Pak presented the idea to Brownes about 18 months ago. After ongoing discussion and researching the pack’s use in overseas markets, the dairy realised it was a special opportunity that would enable it to become an industry leader.
Ohm says it shifted the company from a business-as-
there was a joint commitment for the project to bring more light to the concept of a low carbon circular economy.
Girgis says: “There is a lot of emphasis on the importance of recycling, but less so on how we can make products more sustainable from the beginning. We wanted to improve the sustainability of our packaging across the entire lifecycle of our products.”
Pooch adds that a low-carbon circular economy means the entire lifecycle of products and packaging solutions has a minimum climate impact.
“This means choosing