Cream rises to the top

27 April 2010



It takes technical know-how and sustainability savvy to be considered the ‘cream of dairy packaging suppliers’ preferred by the Top 20 European Dairy producers, as Joanne Hunter discovers.


Dairy has complex sustainability issues that boggle the minds of experts, let alone companies that want to serve the ‘cream’ of the dairy brands.

On the question of packaging choices for sensitive, chilled or ambient milk-based goods, to unravel environmental, economic and social issues is an almighty task: the impact of raw materials must be tracked back to forestry for paper packaging, fossil based oil for plastics, the furnaces for glass and feed crops for the product inside.

There are no shortcuts to winning customers, supplier support and respect from the investor community. Sveinar Kildal knows this all too well: he is Elopak’s director responsible for environmental issues for the carton manufacturer’s more than 80 global markets supplied by 13 production units.

Consensus is emerging among packaging producers and users that total life cycle assessment (LCA) is a fairer way to evaluate the impact of what we produce and consume. The special challenge for the dairy sector will be managing the CO2 component in agricultural production, Mr Kildal believes.

He praises the substantial work already done to rein back environmental impact, including Arla Foods (5/20), among others. The company, which is owned by Danish and Swedish dairy farmers, is big in the UK, too. In 2003, Arla merged with Express Dairies and is the name behind Cravendale milk and the Anchor and Lurpak butter brands. Arla’s report Our Responsibility 2009 elaborates on the ethical position of ‘the world’s largest supplier of organic dairy products’.

The responsibility of a packaging supplier to customers, says Elopak’s Mr Kildal, ‘is to lower the impact we contribute - for example, by reducing material and energy use - and engage the supply chain so, as a whole, it minimises impact’.

“The important point is that Elopak has taken full supply chain responsibility,” says Mr Kildal. A full member in the Carbon Disclosure Project, it plans to earn a high rating by linking up with its suppliers to innovate to reduce carbon.

“We’ve been a CDP respondent for a long time because our customers are members. Now we are asking our suppliers to become respondents themselves, so we can disclose their carbon impact as well”.

Big companies are well resourced and have taken an early active part in the carbon ‘discover and disclose’ process, he observes: “But small, local dairies are important customers to us, too, and we want to give them knowledge and competence.

“It’s complicated stuff to understand and it’s costly for smaller companies to employ LCA experts,” he says.

Food crop production, fertilizers and product manufacture, are complicated areas to assess in sustainability terms; and in packaging, renewable-sourced bioplastics, cost and land-use, are thorny issues.

In the composite carton, fossil based barrier plastics are exclusively used, although Elopak is researching into alternative bio-based plastics.

“We have not succeeded yet in developing a commercially viable process. The challenge is to find new materials that are sustainable in volume,” says Mr Kildal.

“There is acceptable barrier to oxygen transmission, but it’s expensive. A company has to make money; it has to survive.”

He anticipates that second-generation bioplastics based on cellulose, or wood will help avoid land competition issues.

Elopak, he says, puts back around 6-7% of turnover into research and development. This year, it has managed to reduce material use by 7%, with the co-operation of Stora Enso, its main dairy market supplier for paperboard.

Grate accuracy

Ishida Europe technology is helping Berglandmilch to pack grated cheese accurately into resealable bags.

Ishida’s ‘state-of-the-art’ CCW-RS multihead weigher and DACS-W checkweigher integrated into the packing line remain highly efficient despite the sticky cheese consistency. The 14-head Ishida CCW-RS weigher ensures giveaway is no more than one gram per bag. The DACS-W checkweigher, with metal detector, has an output of 270 weighments/min. Berglandmilch’s primary reason for buying the checkweigher was to establish an additional safeguard and prevent complaints. “Contamination almost never occurs, but our customers appreciate our very high safety standards,” says Alois Kronberger.

Austria’s largest milk processor leads the cheese market with brands including Schärdinger, Desserta and Fidus.


Berglandmilch avoids giveaway using Ishida technology. Ishida Top 20

Top 20 Top 20
Ishida Ishida


Privacy Policy
We have updated our privacy policy. In the latest update it explains what cookies are and how we use them on our site. To learn more about cookies and their benefits, please view our privacy policy. Please be aware that parts of this site will not function correctly if you disable cookies. By continuing to use this site, you consent to our use of cookies in accordance with our privacy policy unless you have disabled them.