The Joint Expert Group for Food Contact Materials (FCMJEG) has published its assessment on the use of ocean-bound plastics (OBP) in food contact materials (FCMs) including food packaging for meat, poultry and fish sold in supermarkets. The Food Standards Agency (FSA) and Food Standards Scotland (FSS) have reviewed the assessment and have concluded there is not enough evidence to confirm that it’s safe to use this plastic in food packaging without impacting health.
Ocean-bound plastic is plastic discarded within 50 kilometers of a coastline in a place with limited or no waste management. Many companies use recycled ocean bound plastic in their supply chains to improve their sustainability.
Globally, humans produce 400 million tons of plastic waste every year. Around the world, according to the United Nations Environment Program, one million plastic bottles are purchased every minute, while up to five trillion plastic bags are used worldwide every year. An estimated 75 to 199 million tons of plastic is currently found in our oceans.
“We acknowledge the benefits of recycling abandoned plastic that has been collected from the open environment, especially plastic in danger of entering waterways or oceans (ocean-bound plastics),” said Dr James Cooper, Deputy Director of Food Policy at the FSA. “Such initiatives, if carried out appropriately, can protect the environment while supporting innovation and economic growth. However, our role is to ensure food is safe and we have concerns over the safety of these plastics, which we term abandoned environmental plastic, when used in their recycled form for products such as ready meal containers, fresh food trays and bottles.”
Humans already consume around a credit card a week of plastics, according to some experts which leaves us with plastics throughout our bodies. A better solution would be replacement substances that are better for the environment–such as those derived from seaweed.
The Food Standards Agency is advising businesses not to use abandoned environmental plastic, including ocean-bound plastic, in food packaging. This advice does not apply to recycled plastic from controlled environments such as UK curbside collection, which, it said, can be safely used to package food.
“Recycling plastics into food grade packaging is done with upmost care using material collected from kerbside only to ensure that the plastic derives from food packaging, for food safety reasons,” said Helen Bird, Head of Materials Systems Transformation, WRAP. “There are many products which can and are successfully made using ocean-bound plastic, including non-food packaging, and we welcome this clarification from the FSA. Plastic pollution is an environmental disaster. We must eliminate problematic and unnecessary single use plastic and recycle plastic back into appropriate products and packaging, where possible. Most supermarkets and the food brands they sell are members of The UK Plastics Pact and committed to this end. Through their actions, 33 billion plastic items have already been removed from shelves. But more needs to be done to deal with the legacy plastic pollution.”
