The pantomime villains of industry

11 February 2009

It’s just been panto season. Do some of you feel that every time you mention that you are part of the packaging industry, people are going to boo and hiss? I am thinking of stalking about with a long black cloak on and wearing a fedora hat, though the obligatory twirly moustache has grown with a distressing amount of grey in it. This sense was once again brought home to me a couple of weeks ago when our IOP: The Packaging Society local society chairman was invited onto BBC local radio. Martin Hardwidge had to argue the point about packaging (again), in this case with the mother of an Olympic athlete who had a bee in her bonnet about the amount of packaging that we apparently don’t need. It was a bit of a no-win situation; Martin was in the position where he ran the risk of making the poor woman look foolish, or he could be conciliatory and do the industry a disservice. In the event the piece was run non-confrontationally and the interviewer even conceded a point or two, which was a turn-up for the books.

Sometimes we run the risk of believing the hype, and even contributing to it ourselves. Because few of us are experts in every sort of packaging, it’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking: ‘well, I know we’re not over-packaging, but the other guy is’. Most often we only truly understand the area where our businesses are active, and while we know the intricacies and imperatives of our own products and production, we don’t fully appreciate other forms of packaging. It has become endemic. Packaging companies fall over themselves to present their green credentials, buyers are setting a green agenda and the media sometimes seem to want to discuss little else. Even our awards are becoming dominated by a focus on environmental performance. Here’s my take on it:

Packaging. Was. Already. Green. And. Always. Has. Been.

There. That’s a weight off my chest. Packaging gives a net reduction in waste, so it’s a green technology. QED. Overpackaging is illegal. Not unknown, I accept, but technically illegal. Be strong, argue the toss, and don’t hide behind ‘well, the industry is doing a lot to improve things’. Yes, recyclability has increased from 30 per cent ten years ago to 60 per cent now, but that’s beside the point. By improving recyclability as new materials and new designs come along, we are developing from an already very strong position. Packaging was already green, it’s just getting even greener. Unfortunately, the first time most people become aware of packaging is when it’s in their bin, when it has become ‘rubbish’. Maybe one day people will truly appreciate that what they describe as rubbish is in fact a complex technical product that has delivered the goods they have purchased safely and in one piece to their homes.

There are 60mn people in the UK. Assuming that everyone wants to eat three times a day, that’s 180mn meals, not to mention the millions of other items we buy. The major retailers like to present themselves as large corner shops. Anyone who has even a slight understanding of what lies behind the shop front appreciates the sheer scale of warehousing and logistics required to efficiently and safely deliver products to us. If the entire UK population decided next weekend to do their shopping at the local street market or their nearest farm shop, both of which would immediately collapse under the pressure, they may quite quickly change their tune and start to appreciate that modern urban life wouldn’t be possible without modern retailing and modern packaging.

The government’s Advisory Committee on Packaging released a substantial report at the end of last year called Packaging in Perspective, available for download from the Incpen website (www.incpen.org) among others. I recommend everyone get hold of a copy. The report sets out in a very readable form the key benefits of packaging particularly with reference to food, the challenges that still face the industry and where we should be going. The only thing I would like to add to the document is the vital importance of training for the future. If we are going to be able to understand our own industry properly, and if we are going to be able to have these debates from a position of strength, then we need to have people who have a solid knowledge of packaging technologies and applications across the board. Not just to join debates on radio programmes, but to be able to choose the right materials, develop the best specifications and deliver the best packaging, so that the packaging industry can continue to make sure that it follows the green agenda as it has for the last hundred years or so.




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