LONDON (ICIS)–Discount retailer Lidl will
start using ocean-bound plastic packaging
across 13 fresh fish products in its UK stores
from March, the company announced in a press
release on Monday.
According to the release, Ocean bound plastic
is plastic found within 50km (30 miles) of an
ocean coastline or major waterway that feeds
into the ocean, specific to countries and
regions that lack waste management
infrastructure.
Lidl GB’s Head of Corporate Social
Responsibility, Georgina Hall commented: “We
are proud to be the first UK supermarket
introducing packaging incorporating plastic
that would have otherwise ended up in the
ocean, helping to tackle the problem directly
as part of our commitment to prevent plastics
ending up as waste.
“We are actively looking to extend this
innovative solution to other product lines to
help reduce the amount of plastic ending up in
our oceans and keep our environments healthy.”
The packaging was developed with partners
Copernus, Sharpak and Bantam Materials.
Bantam will supply the ocean-bound plastic via
its Prevented Ocean Plastic (POP) program, and
Sharpak part of Groupe Guillin, a packaging
manufacturer which manufactures Lidl’s new fish
trays, the press release said.
Bantam Material’s Raffi Schieir told ICIS: “We
are aligning recycling standards in at-risk
communities for ocean plastics to deliver the
quality and volumes the market requires while
genuinely doing something positive about the
ocean plastics programme.”
The Prevented Ocean Plastics programme
currently supplies over 1,000 tonnes/month to
the market, Schieir added.
The European recycled polyethylene
terephthalate (R-PET) market struggles from
huge under capacity compared to demand levels,
so any new streams of material that would go
towards addressing the lack of available
materials will be of interest to market
participants.
However, it waits to be seen if other brands
and fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) consider
Prevented Ocean Plastics as an addition or
alternative to existing R-PET supplies.
