Italian rigid plastic food packaging manufacturer ILIP has said that it welcomes the passing of the new Italian law against food waste and the EU FLW Platform.
The Italian legislation aims to cut waste at each stage of the supply chain through the achievement of goals including general waste reduction and recycling, whilst the EU FLW Platform focuses more on food waste prevention.
The Italian law against food waste, gaining final approval at the beginning of August, aims to cut up to one million tonnes of wasted food a year by offering incentives to businesses to give away food waste to charity and by starting new initiatives to limit food waste in hospitals, schools and other public canteens.
Roberto Zanichelli, ILIP Sales & Marketing Director said: “We welcome this new law and platform aimed at fighting food waste, since at ILIP we recognise our role in supporting food processors, retailers and caterers to deliver safer food products and to minimise food waste whose economic and ethical impacts can no longer be ignored. It's for these reasons that ILIP was the first food packaging manufacturer to join the Save Food project, the global initiative launched by F.A.O. in collaboration with Interpack/Messe Dusseldorf, whose purpose is to improve packaging efficiency to avoid food waste along the supply chain. A new approach that focuses on food waste reduction must take into account the role of packaging that should be considered as part of the solution thanks to its dual function of food protection and shelf life extension. This new approach could also bring changes in the current food production paradigm focusing more on food quality than quantity”.
ILIP states that it was one of the first in Europe to produce food packaging made with bio-plastic and recycled PET and now says it works in a real closed loop from post-consumer PET water bottles recycling up to its new r-PET food packaging.