While food packaging’s chief tasks continue to be the physical protection of its contents and to ensure goods can be transported safely and efficiently, its role will expand in coming years to serve a growing variety of new applications, according to AIP member and SPC Ardmona’s senior packaging technologist, Dr Roya Khalil.
In a recent presentation for the Australian Institute of Food Science and Technology (AIFST), Khalil identified key trends in the global packaging market, and identified the main areas where its role is expanding.
“Packaging is not
new, but packaging and packaging technology is evolving,” she told
AIFST members.
Most of these new roles will evolve through a
combination of technological developments and social trends, such as
increasingly busy lifestyles and growing concerns over environmental
and health issues.
As these trends play out out, the global packaging market will experience solid growth over the next few years, especially in developing markets such as China and India, she says.
There will also be shifts in the main packaging materials used. At the moment, paper and carton board are the world’s dominant packaging formats, but by 2016 it will be surpassed by rigid plastics (accounting for 28 per cent of the world market) and flexible plastics (18 per cent). Growth in the metal and glass packaging segments, in contrast, will be stagnant.
Beyond the numbers, however, Khalil says several key trends will see food packaging take on new functions. Ever-faster developing technology, for example, will result in greater use of active and intelligent packaging.
“Technology developments are empowering the consumer to make more informed decisions and even interact with packaging,” she says.
Sensor technology and “smart” films, for example, could provide a more accurate method of assessing a product’s freshness than current passive “best before” or “use-by” dates.
The use of technologies such as QR codes, on the other hand, will enable consumers to access more information about food quality and contents. The use of such codes will also be influenced by another key trend towards more convenient portion-sized packaging to serve an increasingly “time poor” population, she says.
Conveniently sized packaging is one of the fastest growing sectors in packaging, but it is shrinking the amount of space on packs available to communicate nutritional and other information. QR codes, she says, will take over as the main medium for manufacturers to convey such data.
The trend towards retail ready packaging, meanwhile, will pick up pace as retailers and logistics companies look for greater efficiencies in transport and shelf stocking costs.
The move to more sustainable packaging will also continue, and food safety will grow in importance as consumers become more savvy about the issues.
“As packaging and food professionals, I
do suggest we always keep an eye on safety standards and alerts about
packaging and packaging materials,” she says.
Key trends
in food packaging:
- Rise of China and India as key packaging producers and consumers
- Rigid and flexible plastics taking over from paper, metal and glass as the dominant packaging format
- Rise of active and intelligent packaging
- Convenience and portion packaging to increase
- Further dominance of retail-ready packaging
- Greater focus on sustainability
