Boni Bio Ghee clarified butter is the first to offer a recyclable alternative to the traditional paper laminate. While this is a logical step, introducing the replacement was no easy task. 'People have certain expectations of how packaging should feel or look. Producers sometimes have to dare to shake things up a bit’, says Annemarie Abbeel, Sustainable Packaging Manager at Fost Plus.
The dairy sector has the dubious honour of being in the top three sectors where most work remains to be done to make all packaging recyclable. Recognisability and consumer acceptance appear to be major barriers to packaging replacement.
Product must remain fresh and tasty
In the dairy sector, this mainly involves packaging for butter, soft cheeses or the sealing film used for yoghurt. ‘If people are used to a certain type of packaging, they need some persuasion to move away from it. This is true for consumers, but equally so for producers. Above all, they want new packaging to perform just as well so that the product remains fresh and tasty.’
European first
For butter, this did not prove an easy task. The wrap not only has to be flexible enough to be convenient but it also has to absorb the fat from the butter. Boni Bio Ghee clarified butter is the first to offer an alternative to the traditional paper laminate. This makes Colruyt Group one of the pioneers in the European market that have succeeded in launching a recyclable alternative to this traditional packaging.
‘It's a wrap made entirely of plastic, specifically PE film. The product has been on sale for about two months. Colruyt Group is closely monitoring consumer reactions to this product in order to extend the innovation to the other brands in the range, if necessary."
Towards permanently phasing out non-recyclable packaging
In 2019, Belgian businesses pledged that all the packaging they put on the market would be recyclable by 2025. ‘We can already see a clear impact of this measure in our members’ declarations.’ In 2019, the volume of non-recyclable packaging declared was still over 20,000 tonnes, but that figure had already dropped to around 5,000 tonnes by mid-2024. ‘Industry is putting a lot of effort into providing recyclable alternatives for the remaining tonnes, which often consist of the most challenging packaging’, says Annemarie Abbeel.
Broadly speaking, the remaining tonnages come from three specific categories:
- Fresh fish and meat packaging
- Medicines
- Dairy products
‘It mainly involves laminated packaging: aluminium or paper laminates. This is multilayer packaging with a layer of aluminium in between. Since the layers cannot be separated, the packaging cannot be recycled.’
The aluminium laminates used in packaging for coffee, dishwasher tablets and animal feed are being systematically replaced by recyclable mono-materials. Certain crisp tubes, for example, have already been completed transformed. ‘The focus now is mainly on the packaging used for a number of specific products. As is so often the case, the final steps are the hardest. But here, too, more and more recyclable alternatives are appearing on the market, which means that the deadline is still achievable.’