A focus on waste reduction

Apparently, in general, the more complicated the structure of a packaging material, the better the barrier it will provide. However, unfortunately, it is also likely to be less environmentally friendly.

When it comes to shelf life, the more accurately you can predict a product’s sensitivity over a specific period of time, the more easily you can identify optimal packaging materials that will still keep it fresh.

With this in mind, at the Nestlé Research Center in Lausanne, 700 bars of chocolate sit neatly side by side, wrapped in transparent packaging, attached to sensors and exposed to light for 24 hours a day. The aim is to gain an understanding that could help save mountains of packaging every year.

The reason for the research is that although some products are more sensitive than others to elements such as moisture, oxygen and light, not enough is known about the extent to which these ‘degradation factors’ affect sensitive products over the course of their designated shelf lives. The lack of precise data available, as well as the methods for gathering it, can lead manufacturers to overestimate the level of protection a product’s packaging needs to provide.

To discover exactly how much light the chocolate would see in reality, the team is conducting a parallel study that simulates its journey through the supply chain. They’ve taken another set of bars, packed them in same conditions, and are moving them from periods of dark to light to dark again, mimicking their passage from warehouse, to shop, to kitchen cupboard.

In the long run, the findings should enable the company to calculate how much oxygen chocolate will consume when packed in a given material under specific conditions. According to Nestlé, the chances are it’s being ‘over packed’ in an unnecessarily high level of protection.

By tailoring the shelf lives of certain products and revising the packaging specifications that went with them, the company has already managed to reduce the amount of packaging used by 1,500 tonnes annually. So, the long-term gain is clear. The closer Nestlé can get to predicting exactly how certain products will react to different conditions, the less packaging those products will require and that has to be a good thing. As always, please feel free to share your views on the subject.

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