Plastic Packaging Should Focus On Recycling

There is ‘no silver bullet’ to address South Africa’s plastic conundrum, according to Lorren de Kock, project manager for the circular plastics economy at the Worldwide Fund for Nature – South Africa. However, the fruit industry can start addressing the issue by moving away from packaging that is aesthetically pleasing to recyclable and reusable packaging methods.

Plastic is cheap compared with other materials such as paper, metal and glass. It has many more applications than these materials, and also prolongs shelf life, an advantage that is relevant to the fresh produce industry.

However, there is a dark side to this: plastic packaging is the number one debris found in the environment, and its impact is devastating. Worldwide, about nine million tons of plastic are released into the environment each year. In addition to plastic found in the ocean and being indigested by various marine animals, there are also less obvious impacts. Recent research has found that the chemicals leaching from plastic debris into the oceans disrupt the life cycles of the photosynthetic bacteria that produce oxygen for the planet. If every second breath we take comes from the sea, this is a genuine concern.

However, it is not just the macro-, visible plastics, such as plastic bags, bottles and punnets, that are a problem. Macroplastics break down into tiny pieces called microplastics, which are found in the water we drink and the food we eat, particularly seafood.

WHY IS THERE SO MUCH PLASTIC IN THE ENVIRONMENT?

The production of plastic has seen an exponential increase since the 1980s, and the prediction is that it will increase by 40% within the next decade. The scary fact, moreover, is that 75% of plastic goes to waste.