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Indian pkg sector eying immense growth prospects to serve dairy sector
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Friday, 27 February, 2015, 08 : 00 AM [IST]
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Nandita Vijay, Bengaluru
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fiogf49gjkf0d The Indian and global packaging industries perceive the dairy sector as a great source of opportunities to provide advanced solutions focussing on design flexibility and delivering high-barrier technologies.
This observation was made at Futurepac, an industry-focussed seminar-cum-networking-event aimed at analysing the emerging trends in plastic bottle technology for dairy packaging. It was held in Bengualuru recently, and organised by Manjushree Technopack Ltd, in association with Reliance Industries.
With the dairy sector increasingly opting for the retail mode, its range of milk versions like ultra-high-temperature- (UHT) processed, skimmed, powders, yoghurt, cheese, butter, cream, milk-based sweets and ice cream enable the packing sector unleash their innovative concepts to offer bottles, tetra packs and rigid plastic packaging, covering cups, bottles, pots and cans, besides closures, enabling higher shelf life of the dairy products.
Vimal Kedia, managing director, Manjushree Technopack, said, “Packaging has been a high priority for the dairy sector. Plastic packaging solutions have emerged as one of the most attractive options in dairy packaging innovation. It has introduced consumers to the simplest conveniences, such as a longer shelf life and ease of handling consumption and storage.”
Prof N C Saha, director and principal executive officer, Indian Institute of Packaging (IIP) (which was set up by the ministry of commerce and industry), stated that packaging was a sunrise industry in the modern marketing landscape.
Saha stated, “It is driven by the traditional demand for rigid packaging. Particularly for milk-based products, packaging is for preservation and presentation. The dairy sector has three options in packaging: returnable containers like glass bottles, single-service plastic bottles and polythene sachets, and tetra aseptic packs for UHT milk. Besides versions of dairy products like flavoured milk in bottles, dahi in cups or pouches, and paneer, cheese and ghee in barrier packs are now offered.”
Decoding the solutions for milk packaging in plastic bottles Rajat Kedia, director, Manjushree Technopack, said, “Milk needs to b processed to make its right for packaging. There are companies in the world which specialise in this business. They include Krones, GEA, APV and Stork. However, serving the dairy sector is not easy, because milk is difficult to process. There are quality risk levels, colour change, vitamin loss and issues of taste.”
“Therefore, there is the need for a different product packaging treatment process, container closure type, filling process, after-filling process and storage conditions. There are advantages of bottles vis-a-vis cartons. The former has high shock resistence, is 100 per cent recyclable and is easy to handle,” he added.
Mike Rockell, director, Xenos Aseptic Bottling Systems, New Zealand, said, “Poly-ethylene terephthalate (PET) bottles were used to increase the shelf life of milk. Nestle, too, proved PET’s success packaging its chocolate milk in it globally.”
“There is also the need for aspectic processing and filling technology for milk packaging. This is where our aspectic fillers ensure low chemical use and no waste water. There are camera systems which ensure check and reject every bottle that is incorrectly filled or capped,” he added.
“There is also an automatic system of automatic ejection of caps. Therefore, aseptic packaging for bottles, cartons and pouches enables attractive graphics, product visibility, varied shapes, easy first-time opening, effortless pouring, seal on reclose, pack size range, cent per cent recyclability, a long shelf life and sales premium,” Rockell stated.
Paul Schönheit, project engineer, aseptic technology, Krones AG, Germany, highlighted the company’s equipment for milk processing units, and its aseptic processing technology.
Shrikant Agarkar, GEA Procomac, Italy, indicated that the company’s expertise in aseptic and traditional filling lines for dairy products would enable easy single-point control for bottle sterilisation.
“A visible trend is the shift towards high-barrier packaging that is shelf-stable,” said Saha, who added that IIP was now researching on a viable packaging solution for liquid jaggery and ethnic foods to ensure that it could increase their shelf life with high-barrier properties for oxygen and carbon dioxide.
“The institute was able to increase their shelf life from ten hours to 75 days, proving that wonders could be achieved with innovative and attractive polymeric materials,” he added.
“Similarly, the Indian packaging industry has several opportunities to cater to the fresh milk market. Here lightweight and easy-to-chill options would create a new dimension for the packaging sector,” stated Saha.
He felt that it was high time Indian packaging researchers focussed on sustainable innovative concepts, which could be moulded using lesser energy, cost-effective and viable.
The Indian market size for plastic packs is estimated at $15.6 billion, and is growing at over 15 per cent annually. Seven per cent of the growth is from the rigid pack space.
While the United States is the largest consumer of rigid packaging, it would be soon overtaken by China. However, India would be among the top ten players in the rigid plastic space. Flexible packaging was valued at $130 billion in fiscal year 2014, and is estimated to touch the $163 billion-mark by 2017. The global packaging industry is to be valued at $820 billion in 2016. Currently, India stands at $24.6 billion and is placed second globally, after China which is worth $28 billion. While global growth is five per cent, India registers 15 per cent and China clocks 18 per cent.
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