Sustainable Packaging Trends: How Millennials Will Change Packaging Forever

The final piece of the new Mount Fuji World Heritage Center in Japan is soon to be revealed. And the best part? The stunning structure is made from locally sourced wood from PEFC/SGEC-certified forests! Built with local Japanese cypress wood, the striking latticework structure resembles Mount Fuji upside-down. It is also the first construction project in Japan to achieve PEFC project certification. “We pioneered PEFC project certification to ensure that fantastic constructions such as this are able to take advantage of PEFC certification and demonstrate their sustainable credentials,” said Ben Gunneberg, CEO of PEFC International. PEFC project certification provides independent verification that the building was constructed with certified timber, without the need for all sub-contractors to be certified. Click Read More below for additional detail.

As US states embrace extended producer responsibility (EPR) programs, brand owners can proactively design or redesign packaging to come out ahead — and win over eco-minded consumers in the process. In states like Maine and Oregon, new laws are being introduced to bolster municipal recycling initiatives. Dubbed Extended Producer Responsibility Programs (EPRs), the policies aim to reduce the volume and toxicity and increase the recycling of packaging material. EPR programs will also take the cost of recycling off of taxpayers and put them onto manufacturers by taxing them based on the recyclability of their materials. These laws have the potential to create real change two-fold: One, by offering fundamentally expensive municipal recycling programs a lending hand with operating costs, while simultaneously encouraging consumer packaged goods (CPG) companies to reduce their carbon footprint. Given many recycling programs across the country have been suspended due to collection costs and inefficiencies, it’s not surprising that many other states are considering similar regulation.

Two Sides North America today announced the launch of Love Paper, a new campaign designed to raise consumer awareness of the unique and inherently sustainable characteristics of print, paper and paper-based packaging. The centerpiece of the campaign is a consumer-friendly website, lovepaperna.org, where the click of a mouse reveals surprising facts about how print and paper products contribute to a sustainable future for us all. “As consumers become increasingly concerned about the environmental impacts of the publications they read, the products they buy and the packaging those products come in, they need factual, science-based information to make informed purchasing decisions,” says Two Sides North America President Phil Riebel. “But all too often, they have little more than unsubstantiated marketing claims like ‘go green, go paperless’ or ‘going paperless saves trees’ to guide them. We created the Love Paper campaign to make it easy for anyone to get verifiable facts about the sustainability of print and paper products from a wide variety of trusted sources.”