A new study has found that women are 14 percent more likely than men to select environmentally-friendly packaging over non-“green,” more-convenient alternatives. Men surveyed were more apt to select products packaged to provide greater convenience.

World IP Today: Convenience vs. Conscience - Food Packaging in the 21st Century found that people are fairly evenly split between environmental conscience and consumer convenience when it comes to making food- and beverage-packaging decisions. In terms of labeling, while patents mentioning biodegradability, recycling and barrier films are increasing in frequency, a lack of standardization in what constitutes an environmentally-friendly package has resulted in ambiguity as to which packages really are “green.” This issue is expected to receive more attention in coming months as various organizations work on standards.

Other key areas revealed in the study are innovations in tamper-evident packaging and interactive packages that use RFID technology to track food from source to destination.

If you’re interested in packaging, we have resources for our members on the PMA website. In addition, we have the Packaging Impact Award: Excellence in Packaging, which is presented during our annual Fresh Summit International Convention & Exposition. Be on the lookout for details and updates concerning the 2011 Impact Award in early June.

Finally, we’ve recently undertaken a consumer research project focused on produce packaging. You can expect to see those results in early September.

Tags: Packaging, Sustainability

This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 27th, 2011 at 10:00 am and is filed under Packaging, Sustainability. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.