Page 16 - Packaging News Magazine Nov-Dec2020

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SUSTAINABILITY www.packagingnews.com.au | November–December 2020
The whole truth
Determining how
sustainable an item
of packaging is requires
much more than looking at its recyclability. While recycling
is an important piece of the sustainability puzzle, it is not the only one. Ian Ackerman reports.
THE relationship between recycling and overall sustainability is not as simple as it may appear on the sur- face. Dive down and you find a complex constellation of carbon, plastic, fossil fuels, landfill waste, energy, water, and more.
THE REPORT
Multinational food packaging and processing company Tetra Pak com- missioned a market-first comparative lifecycle assessment of food and bev- erage packaging in Australasian mar- kets. The report was carried out by Thinkstep ANZ and was assessed by a critical review panel comprising three independent experts.
The study considered a range of product categories, filling types, and packaging size classes – from 200ml to 2L. It found that cartons, like those Tetra Pak makes, are among the best performers in terms of sustainability
in packaging. Among the types of packaging considered, cartons were the best performers in terms of car- bon footprint.
Tetra Pak has conducted similar studies in various overseas markets, but Tetra Pak managing director Oceania Andrew Pooch said the results cannot be directly translated to Australasia.
“We wanted to get the facts about Australia and New Zealand specifi- cally so we could help make the sus- tainability discussion broader than just about recycling. Recycling is really important but there are many more things we can be doing than just recycling,” he said.
BACKGROUND
The company’s environmental foot- print has been in its consciousness since its founding in Sweden more than 75 years ago, Pooch said.
“This is not something that Tetra Pak has recently stumbled into and, seeing it is a hot topic, decided to do something about it. This is in our DNA,” he said.
Pooch said, while developing a cir- cular economy is important, we must ensure it’s a low carbon circular economy. This is where sourcing of materials and transportation come
[A carton] is essentially a stiff paper bag with a bit of lining in it so you can keep your milk and juice and water in it.” – Vikas Ahuja