“Greening into a new trend”

Count down those environmentally friendly food packaging materials

Nowadays, with the consumption upgrade, the food industry is developing rapidly. As one of the important market segments in the industry, food packaging is expanding its market scale. According to statistics, the food packaging market is expected to reach US$305.955.1 billion in 2019. In addition to expanding demand, the consumer market has gradually increased the environmental protection requirements of packaging materials. At the same time, a batch of environmentally friendly and biodegradable food packaging materials have emerged on the market.

Bagasse made into food packaging

A few days ago, an Israeli technology company announced that after years of research and development, they have successfully developed a natural environmentally friendly material using bagasse as a raw material to replace ordinary plastic to produce instant food packaging boxes. This environmentally friendly material based on bagasse can withstand temperature fluctuations from -40°C to 250°C. The packaging boxes produced with it will not pollute the environment after being used and discarded. At the same time, it can be recycled and reused.

Tofu-based paper packaging

paper packaging is one of the more widely used environmental protection materials, but as far as paper made of wood is required, it also has certain damage to the environment. In order to avoid excessive felling of trees, paper made of food as raw materials was developed, and tofu paper is one of them. Tofu paper is made by adding fatty acid and protease to tofu residue, allowing it to decompose, washing with warm water, drying into food fiber, and adding viscous substances. This kind of paper is easy to decompose after use, can be used for composting, and can also be recycled and re-made paper, with low environmental pollution.

Beeswax caramel made into olive oil packaging bottles

In addition to plastic film, plastic paper, etc., plastic bottles are also one of the prototypes of environmental pollution in food packaging. In order to reduce the pollution of plastic bottles, corresponding food packaging materials are also being developed. A Swedish design studio chose to use beeswax caramel to make olive oil packaging bottles. After shaping the caramel, a beeswax coating was added to prevent moisture. Caramel is not compatible with oil, and beeswax is also very tight. The packaging is made of pure natural materials, which can automatically degrade and will not pollute the environment.

Nanochip film improves potato chip packaging

Potato chips are one of the snacks that we often eat in our daily lives, but the metal film inside is made of several layers of plastic and metal fused together, so it is difficult to be recycled. To solve this problem, a British research team attached a nanosheet film composed of amino acids and water to the package. The material meets the requirements of manufacturers for a good gas barrier, the performance can reach about 40 times that of ordinary metal films, and it is relatively easy to recycle.

Research and development of recyclable plastics

The non-recyclable and non-recyclable characteristics of plastic have been criticized by many consumers. In order to improve this problem, researchers from the University of the Basque Country in Spain and Colorado State University in the United States have jointly developed a completely recyclable material for packaging. It is understood that researchers have found two types of recyclable plastics. One is γ-butyrolactone, which has suitable mechanical properties but is more easily permeated by various gases and vapors; it has high hardness but low permeability. Homopolymer. Both can meet the needs of reuse, repair and recycling.

In recent years, with the rapid development of the food industry and the continuous upgrading of the consumer market, the food packaging industry has ushered in a new development trend, and environmental protection is one of them. In order to resist serious environmental pollution, various recyclable and degradable packaging materials have been continuously developed. For packaging material manufacturers, it is necessary to speed up the research and development of environmentally friendly packaging materials to promote the green development of the food packaging industry.

FUTUR Technology- a marketer & manufacturer of sustainable food packaging in China. Our mission is to create sustainable & compostable packaging solutions that benefit to our planet and customers.