What environmentally friendly packaging materials and technologies are currently available for product packaging?

Packaging of food and other products plays very significant in the process of choice of products these days. Today, beautiful material and design are not enough to convince consumer to choose the particular product. Both the material and design of packaging of the product, and also the packaging technology need to be modern, i.e., environmentally friendly.

Packaging solution specialists from the international company “Multivac OY" Latvian Branch explains what modern and environmentally friendly packaging material, design and packaging machine technologies are. The ideas offered by Multivac OY can be useful for every entrepreneur manufacturing and trading in packaged products.

Packaging material

The current market requirements with regard to sustainable and “green” packaging solution may be met by choosing one of the following packaging materials:

1. Paper fibre-based packaging materials

One of the most meaningful approaches to the packaging concept is to select material, which is a part of the processing cycles instead of invent something new. One of the most popular examples is material made of paper fibres, which may be later recycled for reusing. MULTIVAC PaperBoard has a wide offer of packagings, which are made of paper fibre and suitable for standard packaging equipment – both thermoforming equipment and machines, which pack the product in film.

For more information on this kind of packaging – see video

2. Packaging materials made of renewable raw materials
Biopolymer materials are another alternative used in the development of sustainable packaging materials. “Biopolymers” shall mean materials of two kinds: polymers made of renewable raw materials, such as PLA or PHA, or polymers, which may be manufactured fully or partially using renewable resources, but which are not biodegadable, such as PET or PE.

Just the thermoplastic PLA is the most practicable alternative for manufacture of thermoformed packagings, especially for packaging fresh fruit and vegetables.

3. Monomaterials

Another approach for the manufacturer of ecological packaging is to use just one material or so called mono materials, which are simpler to recycle. Usually, materials made of PP (polypropylene) or APET (amorphous polyethylene terephthalate or PET film) are used.

Packaging design

Packaging design may be very significant, since size and shape of packaging may significantly save material. Likewise, use of thinner materials for wrapping up products reduce the quantity of material used, therefore it is possible to reduce it by using thinned thermoformed film. The product formation process itself also affects use of material, for example, vacuum film packagings, folded packagings and other solutions, which, along with the use of design possibilities, reduce quantity of the used material.

Innovative packaging machine technologies

Quantity of packaging material may be reduced also by using modern machinery. During the process of manufacture of thermoformed packaging, cuttings of material are inevitable. However, the last generation packaging equipment are constructed in such a way as to reduce quantity of such cuttings, thus enabling both saving for the product manufacturer and reduction in the quantity of recyclable or non-recyclable waste. Multivac OY is a company, which offers not only ready packagings and packaging materials, but also the last generation packaging equipment intended for products and packaging of products meeting today's market requirements.

To find out more about possibilities to reduce environmental harm and to present product temptingly, consult experts of environmentally friendly and modern packaging