Balancing packaging safety,
security and sustainability
post COVID-19
Comment from Nigel Flowers, Managing
Director, Sumitomo (SHI) Demag UK
Around the world, health has taken
priority over sustainability. As we begin
to cautiously emerge from the pandemic,
Nigel Flowers, Managing Director of
Sumitomo (SHI) Demag examines how
brands can move forward with their
sustainable packaging initiatives and
discusses the consumer behaviours and
attitudes towards single use packaging
that may stick around in the foreseeable
future.
In the early days of the COVID-19,
sentiments towards sustainability
diminished. Although this was anticipated
to be a short-term shift, concerns
around hygiene, sanitation, crossinfection
and the protection of health
took priority. Initiatives like bring your
own containers and resusable coffee
cups were suspended. Substrate choices
veered back to the ‘perceived’ enemy -
plastic. The big question facing packaging
producers now is how much consumers
in the future will be prepared to trade
off product safety, security and hygiene
against sustainability and whether there
is a middle ground.
For several decades now light-weighting
and consumer convenience have given
packaging manufacturers the strong
commercial incentive to do more with
less. No strangers to responding to
demographic and lifestyle changes and
balancing a wide range of variables,
including cost, increased strength, recycle
rates and functional requirements,
lightweight formats have become the
industry norm. Especially in food and
medical packaging. More recently,
16 FDPP - www.fdpp.co.uk
the market has been moving more
towards novelty solutions that improve
performance, functionality and shelf
impact.
Most companies operating in this
competitive arena produce millions of
packaging containers, caps and closures
every year. Volume, raw material waste
and precision are fundamental to each
packaging manufacturers’ financial
viability, with many facilities operating
20+ machines to meet supplier demand.
To successfully succeed in the thin
walling arena, injection moulders need
to examine every potential application to
ensure that the selection of materials,
machine and tooling give the optimum
blend of speed, quality and consistency.
NEW EXPECTATIONS
Until March, eschewing plastic was
the campaign of the day. The tide was
turning. And I’m in no doubt that public
rallying for circular packaging will resume
in the next six months. Attitudes and
actions will inevitably shift again.
What this pandemic has clearly illustrated
however, is the context in which decisions
about packaging need to be made.
Exploiting people’s fears about reinfection
and sanitation should not be used as an
argument to revert or redefine legislation.
Understandably, the UK’s ban on plastic