Saturdays have become family recycling days, with dads and kids sorting through the weekly recyclable materials, separating them before driving to the local recycling depot.
Who do we have to thank for this saintly devotion to recyclable trash? Well, it could be Al Gore, hailed by some as a prophet for predicting what could be the final burp for the packaging industry.
Having gorged on packaging far too often, our insatiable appetite has led the industry to over-engineer. Time to go lean on packaging or at least introduce smart packaging.
Wal-Mart has initiated a sustainability scorecard in an attempt to force the packaging industry onto a ‘weight watchers’ reduction programme. Could the next big battle be fought over packaging? Or even more hilarious, imagine a divorcing couple fighting over custody of the recyclable trash.
Andy Warhol turned packaging into gold by declaring it art, yet street people and the homeless view packaging as a building material. Views on the subject are as varied as are the types of packaging. Yet, when it’s time to move camp, how many people use grocery boxes in which to pack their belongings. We don’t want to live with it, but then we can’t live without packaging.
Packaging fulfils its intended purpose and then some, so is it not the victim in this crusade? By our actions towards domestic recycling, it’s evident that the well-being of planet Earth is the closest thing to everyone’s heart. So let’s begin to educate the masses regarding recyclable packaging and the public’s role in the recycling process.
I think we should provide dismantling instructions for packaging, or simply state compacting instructions.
Unlike Sweden, home owners in many North American communities rely on the city to pick up and sort their recyclable trash. This means all the items must fit into a standard curbside recycling box, since the recycling process hasn’t progressed past the street curb, meaning there are no bins strategically stationed in the community to deposit the recycling waste.
Therefore the volume of recyclable material a household accumulates between municipal collection days is cause for reflection. The first reaction is one of disbelief. Are we shopping to such an extent? Should we be leaving the packaging at the checkout counter rather than taking it home? Some green crusaders actually do this in England, how many broken eggs before they abandon this tactic?
Corrugated pulp boxes and trays are another item that if adequately detailed and creased, the consumer could flatten so as to reduce the total surface area it occupies. Tin cans present their own unique challenge, but then perhaps it could be as simple as nesting them similar to a matryoshka doll.
One entrepreneur has suggested modifying the pizza delivery box so that it can be used as a plate, plus a leftover container for that last piece of pizza. Simply tear the package along the perforations and refold for either the plates or leftover container.
Glass containers typically signal a premium product to the consumer. For this reason, the consumer has an appreciation for the empty vessel and is willing to go the extra distance to recycle it.
The accelerating popularity of plastic as a packaging material contributes heavily to the complexity of recycling due to the various plastic material types in use. Sorting therefore becomes an issue for communities supplying Material Recovery Facilities. As a result there is a tendency to reject much more plastic than required for fear of accepting a non-compatible plastic such as Polyvinylchloride (PVC) into a Polyethylene terephthalate (PET) processing line. A recent example was a community that was rejecting PET egg cartons citing that they were made of PVC.
There are no shortages of best practices from which my fellow North Americans can launch a sustainable packaging campaign. The pitfall is that, as a North American, you want to reinvent the wheel and in this fashion make a fortune.
© FoodBev Media Ltd 2024