Episode #3 — Breaking New Ground with Compostable Food Packaging
Antione Ambert, Senior Director of Innovation and Sustainability of Alter Eco Foods
The issue of plastic pollution has become more acute in the past decade as we’ve all become more aware of the sheer amount of plastic ending up in our landfills and waterways. Businesses around the world are wondering how to reduce or eliminate packaging from their products, especially in the food industry where huge amounts of single-use plastic is used to protect food as its shipped all over the globe. Some companies are leading the way in revolutionizing food packaging, and we’re lucky to have one of them joining us in this episode.
Show Notes
The issue of plastic pollution has become more acute in the past decade as we’ve all become more aware of the sheer amount of plastic ending up in our landfills and waterways. Businesses around the world are wondering how to reduce or eliminate packaging from their products, especially in the food industry where huge amounts of single-use plastic is used to protect food as its shipped all over the globe. Some companies are leading the way in revolutionizing food packaging, and we’re lucky to have one of them joining us today.
Antoine Ambert is the Senior Director of Innovation and Sustainability at Alter Eco Foods. Alter Eco has been creating Fair Trade and Organic food products since 2005, working with small scale farms from around the world to create excellent foods, support farmers, and benefit the planet. They have been a carbon neutral business since 2008 and turned their sights to creating compostable packaging in 2012.
In this episode Antoine gives us an inside look at the process Alter Eco used to develop a fully compostable packaging solution for its chocolate products. We talk about why the company wanted to commit to becoming fully plastic-free by the end of 2020, some of the challenges its encountered along the way, and what it’s like to design a new type of plastic-free packaging. We also discuss the impacts of packaging on the planet and why changes are needed both upstream in the way packaging is produced and downstream in the way its recycled or composted.
- How and why Alter Eco became interested in developing a fully compostable packaging solution for their products.
- What Alter Eco does to lessen their impact on the planet and support small farmers around the world.
- The process of developing different types of compostable packaging and why it took multiple partners to make it happen.
- Three key questions to ask when creating compostable packaging.
- The importance of both upstream and downstream impacts of packaging on the environment.
- What else Alter Eco is doing to have a positive impact on the planet and its partners while creating excellent products.
What You'll Learn
Links Mentioned
- Antoine Ambert | Alter Eco Foods | LinkedIn | Email
- Elk Packaging
- Associated Labels & Packaging
- The Biggest Little Farm
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