Global businesses, academics, scientists, innovators, entrepreneurs, public services, manufacturers, packaging suppliers and the media came together on 21st March 2019 to discuss the plastic sustainability challenge.
Robert Bridge, Chief Customer Officer, of The Telegraph opened the day, describing how if we do nothing, by 2050 plastic in the ocean will outweigh fish. In the room at the Hilton Bankside, was the insight, experience and willingness to lean in to make change.
The plastic economy and the grocery market – how are the UK’s biggest supermarkets tackling plastic waste
Moderated by Marcus Gover, CEO of WRAP, the audience were keen to hear how the food industry is approaching the big issues.
Jim Brisby, Group Commercial Director of Cranswick plc described the journey the business has been on, and how his colleagues wanted to get their own house in order before becoming vocal on the issue and holding others in the lifecycle to account. They’ve worked in the short term to move all plastic packaging to single polymer mono R-PET which is the easiest to recycle and contains over 70% recycled content (this is being rolled out across all sites), have removed meat pads from packaging and other potential contaminants of the recycling process. Some of the flimsy single use plastic seen in food factories (it covers food, disposable aprons, gloves and hairnets) has been replaced with reuseable alternatives. This has presented challenges with food safety in terms of washing and drying equipment, which needs space and people but does reduce plastic contamination in food.
He described how 619 tonnes of plastic per annum has been removed from the supply chain, which sounds a lot but is only around 5% of the total plastic use end to end. R&D is needed to find more sustainable solutions that do the job of food protection and shelf life, therefore not increasing food waste. Cranswick is looking for collaboration from the value chain to go further.
Judith Batchelor, brand director of Sainsbury’s, talked about funding for R&D – that when the gap between knowing and doing becomes smaller, change can happen. NERC Science did the work on micro plastics 15 years ago – Blue Planet bought it into the public domain last year. Funding could be joined up more quickly, and at scale. Our understanding of consumer behaviour needs to be improved – we need to incentivise consumers to recycle. There is also a change that needs to take place in the way the grocery market does business, as currently it is not seen as a connected value chain. Ultimately if it is right for the planet, it is right for the consumer. She said it was a complicated jigsaw, that would involve accountants accounting different.
Louise Nichols, former corporate head of human rights, food sustainability and food packaging at Marks & Spencer described along with Judith how they were both on a journey to reduce plastic last year and have pivoted to the elimination of unnecessary plastic. The M&S approach is:
1) Refuse (for e.g. coffee pods, plastic teabags)
2) Re-imagine (for e.g. loose fruit and veg),
3) Reduce (creating hairy goals like reducing 1000 tonnes of plastic in one year. One solution was to make the popcorn bag smaller, less plastic, fewer lorries as smaller cases – think around the issue)
4) Incentivise the customer – (they are motivated to get 25p off a coffee by using their own cup – there will be different motivations for different products and consumers.)
5) Recyclability – (black plastic has now all moved to clear, but the consumer is still confused – M&S will take any plastic at store that consumers are unsure of and are working with Dow Chemical who turn that waste into more recycling bins. When there are enough bins, the material will then be turned into playground equipment. They are also working with Waste Buddies to educate schools children to enable pester power.
Louise said this is a once in a generation chance to improve – there could be a good, better, best way of producing packaging that offsets the cost, encourages choice and this is the kind of conversation to be having with suppliers. Jim ended by saying if we all move together the cost will come down.
Finally – Judith explained that every product is a combination of factors that needs a unique approach. Basically – should this product be in packaging or not, have the meaningful conversion, and work with the value chain, technology and identify the invisible sources.