Nigel Coates, managing director of LVF Packaging, talks plastic paranoia, green-washing and a ‘sensible’ approach to plastic packaging recycling.

Three years ago, and with images from Sir David Attenborough’s Blue Planet still seared in the minds of millions, I put my head above the parapet and wrote an impassioned piece for the Yorkshire Post about why banning plastic packaging would be nothing more than a knee jerk reaction with a negative effect.

A joined-up approach to recycling is what I argued for then and sadly it’s the drum I’m still enthusiastically banging today.

The plastic pollution crisis has seen big brand name after big brand name commit to a single use plastic free future but do nothing constructive to actually resolve the issue of plastic waste or come up with an alternative packaging material.

This corporate greenwashing has been a huge PR success for its practitioners; with miles of column inches and page after page of online news reporting the sweeping changes that will occur as a result of these seemingly environmentally significant promises in 2028, 2037 or some other distant date, by which time no one will remember who promised what and by when.

And it’s not just the big brands that have been more bothered about being seen to do something than actually doing something worthwhile.

The Government’s recently introduced the UK Packaging Tax was trumpeted as the big step needed to reduce plastic pollution but look closely and it’s clear it’s delivering nothing.

Under its new rules to avoid a tax levy, plastic packaging trays can only be manufactured in this country using material with a minimum of 30 per cent recycled content.

What it fails entirely to take into account is that the vast majority of plastic packaging trays already have 30% recycled content (and have had for years), but most aren’t recycled because recycling them isn’t commercially viable.

The only plastic item in every day use that’s guaranteed to be recycled is the plastic drinks bottle.

Almost all plastic drinks bottles are manufactured from PET, which means when they enter the waste-stream they can be picked out safe in the knowledge that the material they are made from can be recycled and sold as washed bottle flake to bottle manufacturers for use in making new plastic bottles as well as for extrusion into sheet for the production of plastic packaging.

Replicating this closed loop, bottle-to-bottle economy across all items of plastic packaging has to be the ultimate goal in the battle against plastic pollution. To do this, a standard, recyclable material has to be used across all packaging, and PET with its high recycled content has to be the material of use.

This simple step would remove any doubt from waste companies minds about the material they are dealing with and ensure sheet extrusion companies would look to them to buy raw, recycled material from which to make new material.

As a result, a circular packaging economy would be created utilising the most suitable and sustainable material for the job – plastic.

Let’s remember the plastic waste found floating in our seas and clogging up our rivers didn’t walk there itself. It’s there because we put it there. Therefore, it’s human behaviour that needs to change as opposed to our choice of packaging material.

What also needs to be considered is that the alternatives simply don’t stack up.

We can grow crops to create starch based bio plastics, but does it really make any sense to do so at the expense of food production? And with the effects of climate change causing more and more crops to fail can we really put ourselves in a position where packaging is reliant on a crop’s success?

Cardboard and paper are often touted as the perfect choice but using them to produce sufficient material for global packaging requirements would lead to widespread deforestation – and we all know where that leaves us.

Carboard and paper alternatives to plastic in food packaging would also lead to a surge in food waste, as these supposedly eco-friendly packs would deliver a significantly shorter shelf life than current plastic packaging solutions.

We have extensively researched plastic alternatives; and we have developed a hybrid packaging prototype and invested in the machinery that would enable us to turn this concept into a production product.

The future of packaging does need to look different, but it shouldn’t be plastic free. Rather than waging war against plastic, Government’s all over the world should be working alongside industry experts to develop a standardised manufacturing protocol for plastic packaging that will ensure it can and will be recycled.

The packaging industry has spent years striving to recycle and reinvent what it does to deliver a greener future and stands ready to help provide a solution to the pollution.

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