Key Sustainability Facts

Produktübersicht

Lifecycle of a Product

Combining films and foils (polymers, paper and aluminium) to benefit from the cumulated material properties.
Customisable barriers and other functionalities (e.g. printability, sealing)."
Lightweight and low volume reduces energy used for transport and storage.
Outstanding low packaging-to-product ratio (5 to 10 times lower than alternatives).
Reduced use of materials and energy throughout supply chain resulting in reduced environmental footprint.
Sizes, formats and shapes can be easily and quickly adjusted.

Keeps good things in and bad things out - essential for food, pharmaceuticals and beverages.
Customised barriers and protection by smart combinations of different materials.
Optimising shelf life for a variety of perishable goods.
Can also allow some products to breathe or maintain modified atmospheres for long periods.

Much less material used for the same purpose.
Flexible Packaging packs half of food products in Europe while only using one sixth of all consumer packaging materials.
Much less material in packaging waste stream.
Very low packaging-to-product ratio: 5 to 10 times lower than alternative solutions.
Variable pack sizes to fit product – not one size fits all.
Shape and format can be adjusted to exactly fit product volume - not one size fits all.

Lightweight means less packaging material used and less waste generated.
Flexible Packaging can combine various material properties and offers many functions and capabilities.
Flexible packaging allows for outstanding low packaging-to-product ratio: 5 to 10 times lower than alternative solutions.
Lightweight means less energy used for transport – whether the packaging is filled or empty.

Flexible Packaging has a very low packaging-to-product ratio: 5 to 10 times lower than alternatives.
Packing all food in rigid materials would require an additional 23 million tonnes of packaging materials in the EU.
Packing all food in Flexible Packaging would save 26 million tonnes of packaging materials in the EU.
Packing all food in Flexible Packaging, even with 0% recycling, would reduce the total carbon footprint for packaging by 40% in the EU (≈1% of all EU greenhouse emissions).
Packing all food in rigid materials, even with 100% recycling rate, would increase the total carbon footprint for packaging by 6% in the EU.

When considering the lifecycle of a food product, Flexible Packaging makes for only a small part of the carbon footprint – on average less than 10%.
Production of food inside the pack often represents the major use of resources and major environmental impact.
Flexible Packaging helps in reducing food waste, thus saving important resources - more than needed to produce the packaging itself.
Flexible Packaging saves much more resources than it consumes.

Serving same purpose while consuming much less material and energy resources throughout entire lifecycle.
Less material used results in less packaging waste to collect, sort and recycle.
Even with low recycling rates Flexible Packaging often generates less material losses than alternatives. Nevertheless, the objective is to maximize collection, sorting & recycling.
A 50g rigid pack with a 80% recycling rate results in 10g material loss while an equivalent 5g flexible pack with a 0% recycling rate results in only 5g material loss.

Flexible Packaging is an essential part of the food chain.
It helps to contain and preserve food throughout the chain and enables proper and safe delivery to the consumer.
Flexible Packaging is part of the solution to prevent food waste which is a major environmental and economic problem globally.
Flexible Packaging is generally more resource efficient than alternative solutions due to its very light weight.

1/3 of food produced globally is never eaten – representing a major wastage of resources (e.g. water, energy, land) and unnecessary greenhouse gas emissions.
Flexible Packaging provides solutions thanks to customizable design for appropriate preservation and serving formats.
Adjustable portions and formats reduce potential leftovers on the plate and in the pack.
Offers extended shelf-life and storage options for a wide range of foods (e.g. meat, dairy, coffee, vegetables), thus reducing food waste at the retail and consumer level.

A circular economy aims at minimizing use of resources and generation of waste – it is not just about circularity and recycling.
For packaging, design for a circular economy has to do with the minimization of packaging material losses throughout the lifecycle, and also the minimization of food waste.
Design for only recycling can lead to counter-productive solutions, such as the increased use of heavy mono-materials potentially resulting in an overall higher environmental impact.
In general, Flexible Packaging generates less material losses throughout ist lifecycle than alternative alternative solutions.
The contribution of Flexible Packaging to reduce food waste is another key factor supporting a circular economy.
Flexible Packaging is increasingly recycled fitting even more into a circular economy.

Proper collection at all levels is required for successful recycling.
Collection prevents packaging from leaking into the environment.
To avoid cherry-picking of easy recyclables, mandatory separate collection of all packaging is needed.
Without mandatory collection, Flexible Packaging may not generate sufficient material volumes to make recycling commercially viable.
Mandatory collection is the basis for more investment in infrastructure for sorting and recycling of Flexible Packaging.

A very small part of Flexible Packaging used in Europe is being littered.
Less than 0.1% ends up as marine litter.
This issue has to be tackled.
Waste management systems in Europe need to be optimized – starting with better collection.
Proper collection of all Flexible Packaging will prevent them from leaking into the environment and improve recycling.
Marine litter is a global issue with Europe representing only a small part of it. Adequate waste management is needed everywhere.

CEFLEX was launched to improve the end-of-life-performance of Flexible Packaging to make it even more relevant in the circular economy.
CEFLEX involves the leading companies along the entire value chain: material producers, converters, fillers, brand owners, recyclers and many others (www.ceflex.eu).
This will be achieved by combining optimised packaging design and improved infrastructure for collection, sorting and recycling.
The objective is to increase collection, sorting and recycling of Flexible Packaging across Europe and to develop end markets for the recycled materials.

Flexible Packaging is not yet widely recycled. The very small amount of material contained in Flexible Packaging is generally more challenging to recycle economically than rigid mono-materials.
Key stakeholders of the entire Flexible Packaging value chain initiated the CEFLEX project to improve sorting, recovery and recycling.
Energy recovery is a viable alternative for non-recycled materials.
No successful recycling without proper collection.
Continuous improvemnent of collection, separation and recycling technologies will increase the recycling rates of flexible materials.
Among the recycling technologies already in use are mechanical recycling for mono and mixed (PO) plastics and pyrolysis for laminates with aluminium foil.