Stories theme: Packaging

With roughly one third of the food we produce every year ending up on the trash pile instead of in our stomachs, cutting down food waste is becoming an urgent global priority. High-quality food-grade packaging is part of the solution to this problem.

From forest to consumer to recycling bin, the lifecycle of a paper coffee cup is far more complex than you might think – and chemistry plays an important role in every single step, bringing value for all stakeholders in the value chain. What do these stakeholders expect at each stage of the lifecycle, and what role can they play in helping to close the loop and achieve a zero-waste future for the paper cup?

A two-day outbreak of bacterial spores on a board machine can lead to the loss of thousands of tons of finished food packaging board, at a cost approaching millions of euros.

In extreme cases, microbes can completely overrun paper and board machines. Luckily that doesn’t happen when Karoliina Markkula, Biocide Business Development Manager at Kemira, and her team are on the job to prevent it.