In Malaysia, a premium brand of instant noodles is now available in a flexible plastic packaging made from 30% certified PCR plastic content. Launched at major retail outlets across the country, the packaging is is a world first.
The development is the result of a value chain collaboration that aimed to bring ocean bound plastic brought back into circular material stream for conversion to high-quality flexible packaging.
Headquartered in Malaysia, Scientex, a producer of stretch film, is a leading player in the flexible plastic packaging industry. The company has used Sabic’s certified circular polypropylene, a grade belonging to the company’s Trucircle portfolio, to produce the film for the packaging. The PP, with a mass balance accounted ocean bound plastic content of 30%, served as a direct drop-in alternative in this new application, with no need to change any existing assets and processes.
Ocean bound plastic, or OBP, is abandoned plastic waste found in areas up to 50 km inland from waterways that may eventually be washed into the ocean by rainfall, rivers or tides.
The OBP used in the project is recovered and converted to pyrolysis oil in a chemicalrecycling process. Sabic uses this oil as an alternative feedstock to produce certified circular PP polymer for further processing to BOPP film.
Scientex then manufactures and prints the noodle packs from this film. The entire chain from the management of the collected OBP to the final packaging is accredited under established certification regimes.
“Thanks to this highly efficient collaboration with SABIC, we are able to bring the world’s first advance recycled flexible PP food packaging to the Asian market, using circular OBP,” said Paul Ng Kok Leong, Head of BOPP Film Division, Scientex Group, who called it ‘a milestone in shaping a circular plastics economy in Malaysia and across South East Asia’.