WASTE NOT -
New initiatives from both the private and public sector aim to further chip away at the UK’s food waste issue, as the nation attempts to rebound from being designated Europe’s biggest food waster in 2015.
Kellogg's Cornflakes adding sweet touch to Throw Away IPA
PRODUCT, SERVICE & DESIGN INNOVATION -
This week, more momentum on the anti-plastic front: Unilever will develop a crowdsourced, plastic-free laundry solution to combat single-use sachets; while Stora Enso and Sulapac are developing renewable drinking straws.
Unilever to invest €100K in crowdsourced alternative to plastic packaging
CPG giant Unilever has announced that it will invest €100,000 in a new, plastic-free laundry tablet — a crowdsourced innovation that has the potential to replace single-use sachets of laundry powder, a popular format for laundry detergents in the developing world that is problematic in terms of plastic waste.
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HUNTSVILLE, AL, November 28, 2018 – BASF’s facility in Huntsville, Alabama received the Green Excellence Recognition in Waste Stewardship Award by Honda of America Manufacturing. The award recognizes BASF’s continuous and innovative efforts toward sustainability by significantly reducing production waste and achieving a Zero Waste to Landfill validation from UL. Less than 0.2 percent of waste goes to the landfill at the production facility.
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Signs the New Plastics Economy Global Commitment at the Our Ocean Conference.
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Castlepark Primary School in North Ayrshire will unveil its very own playground made from recycled plastic after winning a national competition to receive a sustainable play area for children.
The playground unveil will happen at 1.30pm on Tuesday, 27th November 2018 at Castlepark Primary School, Irvine, North Ayrshire, with children, parents and representatives from Febreze, Fairy, TerraCycle, Tesco and North Ayrshire Council attending.
Over the summer, Febreze and Fairy partnered with TerraCycle and Tesco to give schools in the UK a chance to win a playground made from recycled plastic. Community members were encouraged to get involved and help their local schools win by voting for them in the competition.
BEHAVIOR CHANGE -
During this season of giving, many of today’s more discerning consumers won’t be joining the masses scrambling to answer the siren call to stock up on discounted “stuff” — they’ll be remembering the values meant to be at the heart of this season, by taking REI’s advice to #OptOutside to enjoy nature and giving back by cleaning up; and when they do shop, they’re increasingly basing their loyalty and purchasing decisions on companies’ reputations rather than just product features and price.
COLLABORATION -
UK grocery giant Tesco and WWF have announced a groundbreaking, four-year partnership aimed at reducing the environmental impact of the average UK shopping cart by 50 percent, improving the sustainability of food while ensuring it remains affordable for all.
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Colgate’s support of The Recycling Partnership is part of the All In On Recycling challenge, which kicked off with a $10 million investment from the PepsiCo Foundation this summer. The goal of this largest industry-wide challenge is to raise $25 million in total donations from leading businesses, companies, and organizations to deliver recycling support to more than 2,800 communities nationwide over the next five years.
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The Procter & Gamble Company extends its long history of doing good in the world by bringing the comforts of home to those impacted by disasters, continuing to spark conversations about diversity, inclusion and gender equality with its advertising and making meaningful impact on the environment with new 2030 goals including a vision to ensure that none of the Company’s packaging ends up in the world’s oceans.
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Braskem, the Americas’ largest resin producer and the world’s leading biopolymer producer, has defined a series of global initiatives to boost the Circular Economy in the production chain of manufactured plastic goods.
“We are firmly committed to the goal of helping to transform the linear economy into a Circular Economy, effectively demonstrating our commitment to sustainable development,” said Fernando Musa, Braskem’s CEO. “By establishing a series of global initiatives, engaging in voluntary commitments and expressing publicly its global positioning for the Circular Economy, Braskem is inviting clients, its partners in the value chain, its Team Members and society in general to intensify their joint quest for innovative and sustainable solutions using plastic.”
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P&G’s global commitment to be a force for good and a force for growth includes our environmental commitments such as reducing our carbon footprint, using sustainable technology, and doing our part to stop the flow of plastic into our oceans. That’s why we’re joining forces with other leading organizations to amplify the ocean conservation efforts of Circulate Capital.
Circulate Capital is an investment management firm dedicated to incubating and financing companies, programs, and infrastructure that prevent ocean plastic. Circulate Capital and Ocean Conservancy, a leading ocean conservation nonprofit, recognized the support of P&G and other consumer packaged goods and chemical companies during the Our Ocean Conference in Bali, Indonesia, earlier this week.
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Tide has reimagined its classic liquid detergent with a new Eco-Box package containing an ultra-concentrated formula designed for eCommerce. The Tide Eco-Box has been in development for the past year and was revealed today at P&G’s headquarters in Cincinnati.
The Tide Eco-Box arrives on a consumer’s doorstep in a sealed, shipping-safe cardboard box. Inside the box is a sealed bag of ultra-compacted Tide liquid laundry detergent. To use, consumers peel off the cardboard flap to reveal a dosing cup and a new “no-drip” twist tap. To make dosing simpler on flat surfaces, the box includes a pull-out stand to raise the height of the box so the cup fits easily beneath the tap.
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As part of its sustainable plastics vision, PepsiCo, Inc. (PepsiCo) today announced a new goal to strive to use 25 percent recycled content in its plastic packaging by 2025.
PepsiCo aims to achieve this goal by collaborating with suppliers and partners, helping to increase consumer education, fostering cross-industry and public-private partnerships, and advocating for improved recycling infrastructure and regulatory reform, all of which are required to realize our ambition. The goal includes an aim specific to PET (polyethylene terephthalate) beverage bottles to achieve 33% recycled PET content by 2025.
MARKETING AND COMMS -
Companies have long run sustainability initiatives that exclude customers. To be fair, these companies have donated a percentage of profits to charities, volunteered employee time, reduced emissions, cleaned up supply chains, and much more. However, their customers have been on the sideline, sometimes aware but not personally engaged.
Through corporate activism, brands can change this dynamic and make customers partners in their most meaningful sustainability initiatives. Here are some tips based on brands that have used it successfully.
WASTE NOT -
Rubicon Global — a technology company providing waste, recycling and smart city solutions to businesses and governments worldwide — along with the University of Pennsylvania Wharton Business School’s Initiative for Global Environmental Leadership (IGEL) and surplus food donation-management platform Goodr, tonight announced the list of inaugural “Waste Fit Champions,” a program designed to recognize the best sustainability leaders that are cutting down on waste, improving rec
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Plastic waste and pollution have captured the attention of the public, governments, and businesses around the world. The search for solutions has started, and there is growing recognition that quick-fixes that address the symptoms is not enough. To effectively switch off the tap on the plastic problem, a systemic shift to tackle the root causes is needed.
To further accelerate the sense of urgency and momentum gaining around marine plastic litter, the Ellen MacArthur Foundation has launched the New Plastics Economy Global Commitment.
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Johnson & Johnson Consumer, Inc. today announced the company is joining an ambitious effort to move the world closer to a circular economy in which plastic never becomes waste. Together with the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, the UN Environment Programme, and many industry-leading companies, governments, and NGOs this commitment will strive to meet goals to tackle one of the most urgent environmental issues of our time: plastic waste and the necessity of consumer packaging reform.
COLLABORATION -
NOTE: This article was updated on October 30, 2018 at 11:45am ET.
A Global Commitment to eradicate plastic waste and pollution at the source has been signed by 250 organisations including many of the world’s largest packaging producers, brands, retailers and recyclers, as well as governments and NGOs. For some signatories, the Global Commitment is just one facet of their plan to overhaul their approach to plastic.
The New Plastics Economy Global Commitment is led by the Ellen MacArthur Foundation (EMF), in collaboration with UN Environment, and was officially unveiled at the Our Ocean Conference in Bali today.
THE NEXT ECONOMY -
This week, building on news that HP, Inc and IKEA joined a global consortium working to develop the first global network of ocean-bound plastics supply chains, the public and private sector made further strides on creating a circular economy for packaging around the world.