Initiative driving innovative paths to sustainability
As regulations aimed at increasing the sustainability of packaging are passed in the U.S., Canada and the EU, the impetus to find workable, cost-effective solutions grows.
A new $25 million initiative from the USDA is driving that push. As part of the USDA’s Assisting Specialty Crop Exports (ASCE), program, the International Fresh Produce Association’s (IFPA) Foundation for Fresh Produce and partner Clemson University will each receive $5 million in federal funding to establish a Sustainable Packaging Innovation Lab.
The lab will focus on projects and research to accelerate the development of new packaging and labeling options. The foundation will also partner with the Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research (FFAR) and the University of Florida to implement the program.
The innovation lab will provide up to 20 awards between $50,000 and $250,000 for research that leads to the development and commercialization of scalable, sustainable packaging solutions, including replacements for single-use packaging, according to a news release.
“USDA wanted to form these innovation labs to come up with new designs for packaging for specialty crop exports,” James Sternberg, assistant professor – sustainable packaging in Clemson’s Department of Food, Nutrition and Packaging Sciences, told Produce Processing. “The new regulations in Canada and Europe that respond to plastic waste and the need for increased PCR (post-consumer recycled material) in packaging, as well as getting rid of one-time use packaging — all of that is the basis for setting up the sustainable innovation packaging labs.”
FFAR will handle the selection process. Applications are due by Feb. 12, and a Jan. 13 webinar will provide more information. Online registration is available.
Clemson will guide the chosen projects in “kind of a virtual lab where all of these projects will be going on at home institutions,” Sternberg said.
“The idea is to do pilot projects, to do commercialization projects, even some fundamental research, all trying to come up with new types of materials and new types of packaging that meet these new regulations.”
The project builds on three years of IFPA’s Fresh Field Catalyst Accelerator program, which works to scale up industry innovation. The labs will research and explore packaging options to help the specialty crop industry continue to supply international markets while lessening reliance on single-use plastics.
“The packaging and labeling requirements for export markets are changing at a rapid pace,” Max Teplitski, IFPA chief science officer, said in a late October news release announcing the innovation labs. “This investment from the USDA will turbocharge the development and scale-up of innovative packaging compliant with emerging global packaging regulations.
“Our partnership with FFAR, University of Florida and Clemson University is exactly what the industry — and frankly the consumers as well — need to continue to remove barriers to trade and access to fresh fruits, vegetables, berries and nuts.”
A changing landscape
Several new packaging and labeling regulations have been introduced in recent years in the U.S., Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia and the EU.
First implemented in the EU, Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) laws make producers of any product on the market, including packaging and packaging waste, responsible for the lifecycle of their products. In 2021 and 2022, seven U.S. states — California, Colorado, Maine, Oregon, Minnesota, New Jersey and Washington — passed similar laws.
California’s Plastic Pollution Prevention and Packaging Producer Responsibility Act set particularly ambitious goals for 2032. By that date, 100% of packaging in the state must be recyclable or compostable; 65% of all single-use plastic packaging must be recycled; and plastic packaging must be reduced by 25%.
A 2022 report on “The Future of Packaging and Sustainability,” issued by the Association for Packaging and Processing Technologies (PMMI), found support among consumers for ending single-use plastics and increasing the use of paper and other alternatives, while food manufacturers expressed the need for competitively priced solutions that meet EPR goals.
Produce industry insiders are also concerned about maintaining food affordability while addressing sustainability requirements. In November 2023, IFPA CEO Cathy Burns and Vonnie Estes, IFPA vice president of innovation, attended a roundtable meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau focused on U.S. and Canadian consumer food affordability.
Burns expressed concern that a directive from Environment and Climate Change Canada, which aims to eliminate plastic packaging in produce sold in Canada by 95% by 2028, could drive up food prices. EPR law in the country also requires obligated producers to join Producer Responsibility Organizations (PROs), report packaging data and pay fees to sell products in most provinces.
The IFPA representatives highlighted the role that plastic packaging plays in ensuring shelf life, affordability and convenience and stressed the need to exempt plastic packaging for fresh and fresh-cut products, as well as functional PLU (price look up) stickers, from the directive.
“PLU stickers solve a lot of challenges at retail, and they are critical to price integrity and product identification — especially for organics — and more packaging would be needed without them,” Estes said in the release. “A Canadian rule is demanding all PLU stickers be compostable, and we shared that multiple efforts are in progress to develop a compostable sticker. For example, IFPA is working with Sinclair on a USDA grant for a compostable option and IFPA member (and Canadian-based company) Accu-Label has one in development as well.”
Estes emphasized both the importance of innovation and the need for patience.
“Innovation takes time in addition to investment,” Estes said. “We were clear that the shortest and most effective path to decreasing plastics is in innovative partnerships.”
Search for solutions
That’s where Sternberg and his colleagues in academia hope to play a crucial role.
“My position is a professor of sustainable packaging, so I teach classes on sustainability,” Sternberg said. “The projects that I do in my own lab have to do with a lot of these types of concerns, whether it’s recycling or bio-based content or biodegradation.
“The particular focus here is on exports, so we are serving the USDA. They feel like there’s a real dire need to address these new regulations so that these companies — the peach farmers, the strawberry farmers, the nut farmers, all of these people that produce specialty crops — don’t get into a jam where they don’t have the right kind of packaging requirement in the future when these regulations go live or when they get more strict.”
Sternberg believes that sustainable yet affordable solutions exist, such as the PLU research mentioned by Burns as well as the exploration of bioplastics, made from renewable resources such as cellulose or shellac.
“It’s not like we have to go back to the drawing board. A lot of these solutions are at the pilot level or even past the pilot level,” he said. “They just need to get past the last hurdle and be commercialized.”
Sizable challenges exist, though, Sternberg said.
“In the EU, they don’t want anything under one and a half kilograms to have its own package. Strawberries that come in clamshells, or any produce that you would normally get on a very small scale in its own package — they want to get rid of all that packaging,” he said. “So you just have to think about, what are some bulk transporting solutions for that? They (also) want to get rid of all shrink wrap. Shrink wrap is used a lot in transport, to wrap a bunch of boxes together, (and) to keep produce fresh.
“They’re not necessarily the most difficult things, but what it boils down to is, what is the tradeoff that you get as far as shelf life is concerned? A lot of the packaging now is to make sure (food) gets there safely, to make sure it doesn’t spoil, and that once it gets there, it can be on the shelf for seven to 10 days, or maybe longer.”
Another concern is making sure new packaging solutions don’t increase food waste. Sternberg said projects will be required to include a Life Cycle Assessment to explore those implications and address the environmental impact of methane created by decomposing food.
The goal of the sustainability labs, Sternberg said, is to help the USDA and other research partners find sustainable, affordable packaging solutions that will help specialty crops continue to move smoothly between countries.
“It’s exciting from an intellectual standpoint, because I get to help discover new types of packaging,” he said. “The entire objective is to help this industry be prepared when these new regulations come online.”
