Author：Melissa Bryant | TIME：October 23, 2019
Imagine our homeland is covered by excessive plastic products that take up to 1,000 years to decompose in landfills. According to the scientific research, plastic bags we use in our daily life take anywhere from 10 to 1,000 years to decompose, while for plastic bottles, 450 years or more. This is a lot longer than many other materials.
Actually both you and I should have sensed that the threat brought by the worsening environment. What we do to the Earth, it pays back. Even with the development of science in aerospace, the Earth is still the only planet for us to live in.
So be friendly to our homeland! Otherwise, we will lose the only living place.
Garbage is inevitable in our daily life, what we can do and should do is minimize the output and use eco friendly, recycable material. Awareness of environmentally friendly and sustainability has been evoked among the Earth’s villagers for quite many years, and sustainable packaging is one of the best examples of our effort to protect our homeland.
So what is sustainable packaging?
Sustainable packaging is the development and use of packaging that leads to improved sustainability. It advocates use of life cycle inventory and life cycle assessent for packaging, in which way it helps reduce the environmental impact and ecological footprint.
Unlike traditional packaging, sustainable packaging use eco-friendly packaging materials that are decomposable. And of course, the shorter the decomposition cycle is, the more friendly to the environment. And here are some of the benefits of sustainable packaging.
Green packaging is recyclable and compostable, thus is good for the environment where we live in;
Compared with popular notion, eco-friendly packaging is more economical in the long term;
Businesses adopt eco friendly packaging are more welcome by consumers, which helps build their brands;
Many countries encourage sustainable packaging and even offer tax incentives to businesses following this packaging trend.
Eco friendly packaging will be the theme of packaging in the global. So what to do next?
The best solution to sustainability is to reduce use of packaging. But in most cases, this is quite impossible. Anyway, if that has to go on, just make sure you go the eco-friendly direction.
For the past decade, we’ve seen a variety of sustainable packaging trends that are followed by a lot of companies and businesses.
Recyclable Packaging
Recycling requires a lot of effort, but it is worthy. Post-consumer packaging that is recyclable needs to meet the standards of separability, cleanliness, labelling and coloration. Packaging made from PET, HDPE, PVC, LDPE, PP and PS are recyclable.
Compared with recycling, reuse of packaging may be more difficult to put into use. It has a higher requirement for the materials - rather than poor quality and disposable materials, strong packaging materials are needed so they are able to endure reprocessing such as washing and sterilizing. One of the best solutions of this green packaging trend is glass packaging that we are specializing in.
Biodegradable refers to the capability of materials to break down and return to nature. Biodegradable materials must thoroughly break down and decompose into natural elements within a short time after disposal, generally a year or less. This can help reduce the pileup of garbage within landfills. Biodegradable materials include corrugated cardboard, and even some plastics (though most plastics are not biodegradable ). Some reusable grocery bags or shopping bags are also made from biodegradable materials.
Compostable packaging refers to miniature bottles or other packaging forms made from renewable resources. Similar to biodegradable materials, compostable materials are to break down and return to the earth. The difference is that compostable materials can offer the earth with nutrients once the they have completely broken down. And unlike biodegradable materials that are designed to break down within landfills, compostable materials require special composting conditions dependent on wind, sunlight, drainage and other factors.
So which sustainable packaging are you using for your products? If your business has not been in the queue, or even has not taken it into the agenda, maybe it’s time to think it over.