Schwertberg, Austria – The Austrian packaging industry has come together to form a new platform that is seeking to promote and increase the sustainability of plastic packaging.
The initiative, launched by total of seven founding companies which include Alpla, Greiner, Coca-Cola Österreich, Nestlé Österreich, Interseroh, Erema and Engel, aims to improve public awareness of the meaningful use of packaging.
These seven companies collectively cover a large part of the value chain. Called the "Verpackung mit Zukunft” (Packaging with a Future) platform, the idea is to work together in a network, with each company leveraging its particular expertise and technology, in pursuit of a global circular economy for plastic packaging.
As Stefan Engleder, CEO of the Engel Group declared: "The circular economy is an interdisciplinary challenge.” Although the image of plastic packaging has dramatically worsened over the past few years, the fact remains that plastics nonetheless often have a significantly better CO2 footprint compared to other packaging materials.
One of the new platform’s goals is therefore to get the message across: reduce, replace, reuse, recycle - this is what is needed to ensure that packaging has the least possible impact on the environment.
"It's not the material that is the problem, but how it is handled,” said Engleder, whose company is working to further develop and expand the technology needed to achieve consistent product quality despite fluctuating raw material quality – such as is often the case when using recycled materials.
Among other things, the Packaging with a Future platform members are also working to establish new standards for sustainable packaging at a supraregional level and, in general, to bring about a differentiated perception of plastics