The six Rs of sustainability

Packaging
experts point out three more fundamentals to sustainability in addition to
Reduce, Reuse and Recycle.

by Rick Lingle, Editor in Chief

An
easy-to-remember mantra for sustainability strategies has long been the 3 Rs:

• Reduce
• Reuse
• Recycle

I have
discovered that there are more, in fact twice as many.

During a fall
interview, H.J. Heinz Co.’s Michael Okoroafor, VP, Global Packaging Innovation
and Execution, told me of a 4th R that Heinz follows related to
sustainability: Renew, as in PlantBottle technology and other renewable
materials Heinz uses for ketchup and other products.

“Depending on which product we’re delivering, we leverage some or all of
[the Rs],” he said.

In a December
interview, ConAgra Foods’ Gail Tavill, VP, Sustainable Development, told me of
a 5th R: Remove. “Isn’t that just an extreme form of Reduce?” I asked.
“No, remove is a
whole different strategy,” she responded. “We’ve had situations where we removed
overwraps or bits of packaging that were unnecessary. Renew is an interesting
one for me, one that has to be very thoughtfully considered such as when you
move to a renewable material from something else.”

Now that we were
up to 5 Rs, I figured that should cover things.

Well, it did for
about a month, until I had an early 2012 chitchat with bioplastics expert Jeff
Timm of Timm Consulting (www.linkedin.com/in/jefftimm).
As we talked about bioplastics and sustainability, I casually mentioned with
admittedly a small feeling of accomplishment that I had learned there were now
5 Rs. Timm responded that he had come across a 6th: Replace, which
of course means substituting one material or structure for another. Replace
requires different strategy and tactics versus the other five.

Thus, as of this
article, there are now unofficially six Rs; if you know of any more, please
email me at lingler@bnpmedia.com so
we can all keep up to date.