The Packaging and Specialty Plastics (P&SP) unit of Dow has introduced its all-polyethylene (PE) laminate, such as Innate and Retain, for flexible packaging industry in India, offering it an easy-to-recycle solution for used packs. At present, flexible packaging – which packs products, such as salt, flour, detergent and many other food products – uses multiple materials that are incompatible while recycling, thus impacting quality of recycled material. “What would make the whole plastic waste management and recycling effort much more meaningful and economical is adoption of packaging using monomaterial to design a sustainable solution – an all-PE laminate. This enables us to make film that does not impact packaging quality or performance, but generates completely reusable material upon recycling,” elaborated Vipul Babu, commercial director for Indian Subcontinent, Dow Packaging & Specialty Plastics, summing up the use of monomaterial laminate solution. To illustrate the advantage of the new technology, Dow, in partnership with packaging machinery manufacturer Bosch, recently conducted a demonstration for the flexible packaging manufacturers as well as brand owners at Bosch’s facility in Goa. Through this partnership, Dow India and Bosch aim to offer practical solutions to the recyclability challenge faced by flexible packaging industry. The all-PE monomaterial laminate solution is a part of sustainable flexible packaging solutions from Dow India and will enable more effective recycling and reuse of flexible packaging material, thus fueling a sustainable circular economy and help brand owners comply with evolving government regulations regarding plastic packaging in India. Mark Saurin, commercial vice president for Asia Pacific, P&SP, Dow, commented, “The umbrella initiative of Dow P&SP, our sustainable packaging solutions line has been successful globally. In India, this is an opportune time to talk about some of these technologies because of the recent plastic waste management policy of Government of India that looks to address this issue in a more sustainable way. All-PE laminate solution is an effective way to create a circular economy around plastic waste management.”
