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Environmentally Friendly Packaging

Since 1950 more than 100 billion tons of plastic have been dumped into the earth’s ecosystem necessitating the use of environmentally friendly packaging now and in the future. Many of the plastics filling landfills have no known expiration date and could last for tens of thousands of years before breaking down into biologically useful components. Larger pieces already cause problems to many marine animals that can choke, or become entangled in them.

Sustainability is one major part of producing environmentally friendly packaging. It involves using recycled materials, reducing the emissions of the places that produce the packaging, and increasing the amount of materials that are recycled. One way grocers have increased sustainability is by offering small discounts for people that use their own reusable bags.

The advantage to environmentally friendly packaging is not immediately apparent, but will be in the future. The production of waste is a huge issue around the world, many countries have run out of places to put it, and have begun shipping garbage to other countries or simply dumping it in the ocean. There are dead spots in the ocean that are filled with over 100 pieces of plastic per cubic foot. Even if every package was recycled from now on, it is still a huge problem. Environmentally friendly packaging can slow this problem down, but won’t correct what has already happened.

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