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Overcoming plastic paranoia

15th Apr 2020

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In recent years, there’s been an overpowering focus on plastic packaging. This has created commercial misinformation and a growing consumer confusion, leading to the demonisation of plastic.

According to BrandWatch, conversations around plastic across social media increased by almost 300% from 2017 to 2018. This ‘plastic paranoia’ is one of the key factors that our research identified when looking at where the risks lie in widening the Green Gap.

For example, government initiatives and the policies we’ve seen to date are geared towards a circular economy dominated by end of life options and types of packaging material.

Our research supports this showing that 61% of businesses believe ‘end of life options’ will be the most important factor influencing packaging strategies in the next decade. This marks a considerable change from current levels of 43%.

While this is a positive shift – and demonstrates that businesses are taking responsibility for where their packaging ends up – a more holistic ‘lifecycle’ view of packaging is what’s required to create a truly sustainable approach to packaging strategies over the next decade.

The reality is that the infrastructure is not yet in place across the UK for consumers to efficiently recycle all of the plastic packaging that’s part of their daily lives.