nir-vana innovation network

A Dutch company is one of the largest players in the poultry meat market in Europe and supplies chicken products, ready meals, and a large variety of salads to leading European food partners. Today, the company produces a large amount of private label salads for their clients, such as supermarkets. All parties are aware that the plastic packaging material of these salads puts a heavy burden on the environment and that it must be replaced by a more sustainable solution. Furthermore, there is a changing trend among consumers towards supporting sustainability which corporations can no longer ignore. Sustainability goals could be achieved in different ways. For example, you can reduce plastic weight, reduce the CO2 footprint, or reuse trays according to the single-use plastics (SUP) regulation. Currently the transparent salad trays for Modified Atmosphere Packaging (MAP) reached their minimum weight of plastic, so there is no more opportunity to reduce further in weight. It is for this reason that the company is looking for an out of the box packaging solution that meets the requirement of the sustainable goals as mentioned above. It’s important that the new salad packaging contains mono materials, and the quality of the ready-to-eat meal is ensured. The main question for this challenge is: “How can the company (co-)develop and use innovative packaging designs to make their private label salad trays more sustainable for their retail organisations? Companies, academics, or inventors are sought via a technical cooperation agreement or a license agreement.