my country's express packaging green resources

my country's express packaging green resources

With the increasing popularity of online shopping, the express delivery business is also growing rapidly. In 2015, China's express delivery business completed 20.6 billion pieces, a year-on-year increase of 48%, and the highest daily processing volume exceeded 160 million pieces. China has become a leading express delivery country. But whether it is a consumer or a courier company, a common trouble is to face a mountain of express packaging.

Express packaging is mostly used only once

According to the statistics of the State Post Bureau, the consumption of express packaging in recent years is astronomical: in 2014, the country consumed a total of about 14 billion express waybills, 2 billion woven bags, 5.584 billion plastic bags, 2.1 billion envelopes, and 6.7 billion packaging. Box, 11.45 billion meters of tape, 2.01 billion internal buffers. Most of these packages have not been recycled, this one-time use has caused serious pollution and waste of resources to the environment.

According to a recent sample survey of the express delivery industry, the three types of packaging currently used most in China's express delivery are in terms of materials and materials. The document envelope and carton are made of recycled paper and raw pulp paper; the plastic packaging bag is made of non-degradable recycled plastic Made with raw plastic. From the perspective of post-use disposal, the document envelopes and plastic bags are discarded as household waste after use. Some recipients of paper packaging boxes will be reused, but most of them are discarded or sold as waste products.

In November 2015, the “Report on the Current Status and Trends of Green Packaging Development in China’s Express Delivery Area” jointly issued by the State Post Bureau and other agencies pointed out: “The current market competition environment and status quo, whether express delivery packaging is used in degradable, recycled and other environmentally friendly materials In terms of recycling, treatment and reuse, there are difficulties that cannot be overcome." Obviously, this is contrary to China's current requirements to vigorously promote the use of waste resources and create a circular economy development model.

The bottleneck of green express packaging

In August 2011, the State Post Bureau formulated and issued the "Guidelines for the Operation of Express Delivery Services" for the rapid development of express delivery services. Checking the specification, you will find that it only stipulates the procedures for receiving, sorting, transportation, and delivery of express companies and the requirements of facilities and equipment for express business premises, but there is no clear provision on how to package express delivery. In 2014, the industry standard "Measurement Methods for Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Express Services" was introduced, and one of the important contents was the pilot packaging and reuse in express companies. With the introduction of this industry standard, domestic e-commerce companies and express delivery companies began to explore new ways for express packaging.

At the end of 2014, a media survey stated that three express companies, Shentong, Yunda and Yuantong, expressed their willingness to recycle express packaging boxes. In the same year, e-commerce Dangdang took the lead in promoting starch-based degradable environmentally friendly packaging bags. Dangdang executives claim that this kind of packaging bag can save 70% of oil resources consumption compared with traditional plastic bags. It is currently used in book plastic packaging and packaging.

COFCO's Womai.com started earlier in this respect. The company began recycling carton distribution in 2012. In 2014, the Shanghai-based e-commerce "No. 1 Store" launched the "1 environmental protection carton recycling" activity in nearly 20 cities such as Shanghai, Beijing, Tianjin, etc., and each carton collected will receive a "No. 1 Store" 50 points, which can be used to redeem merchandise, participate in lottery draws, redeem coupons, etc. From January to September of that year, "No. 1 Shop" recovered a total of more than 2.46 million cartons, with an average monthly recovery of more than 270,000.

In April of this year, the logistics platform of the e-commerce giant Alibaba Group-Cainiao Network began to deploy "green logistics", including environmentally friendly express boxes, environmentally friendly express bags, environmentally friendly express vehicles and other products. Cainiao Network attempts to introduce reusable safe plastic material environmental protection boxes, gradually replacing courier cartons. After the buyer signs and receives the goods, the courier takes the box back and returns to the delivery warehouse according to the process. At the end of the year, the environmental protection box is planned to be promoted to 20 cities covered by the "Day-to-Day" rookie alliance. In addition, Cainiao Network is working with government departments, industry associations, and enterprises to produce degradable environmentally friendly bags, which will naturally decompose in the soil after a period of time to avoid pollution-but its cost is a few Times.

In a nutshell, the main bottlenecks for express packaging to open the green model are increased costs, lack of packaging standards, and the possibility of repeated packaging breakage, which has led many consumers to be unwilling to cooperate.

Hierarchical diagram of solid waste disposal strategy

Hierarchical diagram of solid waste disposal strategy, which provides a layered disposal plan for the whole process management of logistics packaging.

In recent decades, the international community has reached a common consensus on the disposal of solid waste including express packaging, that is, the whole process management of solid waste according to the principle of waste hierarchy, and prevention in advance from the disposal strategy (try not to generate waste) , Reduction, reuse, recycling, energy recovery (incineration and power generation, etc.) and harmless treatment.

In other words, express packaging should be planned from the source, so that the packaging produces the least amount of waste. For most developed countries, the question is not whether products and packaging should be more sustainable, but how to achieve sustainability. In terms of green packaging, it is a common practice in many developed countries to use policies, regulations and technical standards to regulate the packaging of commodities.

Germany: Mandatory recycling by legislation

In the laws and regulations, the responsibilities of all parties are clearly defined to facilitate waste recycling and accountability. Germany's approach in this regard is very prominent. In the 1990s, Germany issued the "Packaging Waste Management Measures", which proposed that packaging waste management should be carried out in the order of "reduction, reuse, recycling, and final disposal", and set different packaging waste recycling Target and time limit, mandatory packaging manufacturers and sellers are jointly responsible for packaging recycling. The approach also establishes quantitative standards for packaging waste from collection to final disposal, such as stipulating that 80% of packaging waste and 100% of transportation packaging must be recycled, so that each link of packaging processing has specific standards to follow. Germany also introduced the "Package Recycling and Recycling Law", which requires that in addition to packaging manufacturers, companies engaged in transportation, agency, wholesalers, and retail must also be responsible for recycling packaging

United States: Tax reduction for recycling and packaging companies

The United States has been focusing on green packaging since the 1990s. In order to increase the enthusiasm for enterprises to recycle packaging, the US state governments appropriately exempt enterprises from related taxes according to the level of enterprise packaging recycling utilization. At the same time, the United States also stipulates in the “Resource Protection and Recycling Law” that “reduce the consumption of packaging materials and recycle and reuse packaging waste”. The internationally renowned carton manufacturers Tetra Pak, Airopark, Vegreen Packaging, Combibloc, etc. have established the Carton Council to promote the recycling of cartons in the United States. At present, the United States has formed an industrialized operation in the recycling of packaging waste, which not only improves the environment and resource utilization, but also provides a large number of employment opportunities.

In addition to packaging design, some American companies have also actively explored packaging technology. The wine packaging in the picture is made of straw, which has high strength, is convenient for logistics and transportation, and is environmentally friendly.

Japan: encourage packaging recycling

In the Asian region, Japan's performance in green packaging is outstanding. Japan not only formulates and implements the “Packaging Recycling Law”, it is also committed to the construction of a recycling system and encourages the establishment of a large number of recycling stations in the country. After consumers classify packaging waste, the Japanese collection and transportation system will discard the sorted packaging. The goods are transported to a special processing center for recycling and remanufacturing through timed recovery, collection and transfer.

Amazon has launched "anti-frustration packaging" at the specific level of express packaging technology, and some countries have also made a lot of efforts. The following are three representative cases.

Amazon has launched "anti-frustration packaging" at the specific level of express packaging technology, and some countries have also made a lot of efforts. The following are three representative cases.

American e-commerce Amazon launched the famous "Frustration-Free Packaging" packaging in 2008. Literal translation is "frustration-free packaging". It sounds sloppy. In fact, it is translated into "anti-breakage simple packaging". It is easy to understand. The common form of this simple packaging is a simple carton, without flashy decorative accessories, and even the product trademark will not appear on the packaging. And a big advantage of this kind of carton is that it is easy to open, and it does not even need the assistance of tools such as scissors to damage the box on one side. When you realize that you can't open a package by using scissors to exhaust milk, you can understand why this simple package can be "anti-frustration".