Sustainability Watch

NORTHFIELD, Ill.—Kraft Foods started the new year 150 million pounds leaner, having eliminated material from its supply chain through sustainable packaging design, sourcing, and partnerships. "Our global team of employees is doing a phenomenal job creating opportunities to reduce packaging material while assuring convenience and safety," says Jean Spence, executive vice president, research, development, and quality. "We've invented a tool to help us design more efficiently. And we're finding smarter source materials, reducing our footprint, and thinking differently about packaging end of life."

The greatest opportunity to influence the environmental impact based on a package's size is early in the design phase. To assist in this endeavor, Kraft Foods developed the Packaging Eco-Calculator™, a tool that helps developers create efficient and optimized packaging. Two examples of its use include:

• In the U.S., the Oscar Mayer Deli Creations packaging was redesigned with 30 percent less paperboard. Consumers like the new package because it's smaller, convenient, and takes up less shelf space, while the amount of product remains the same.

• In Europe, the removal of packaging layers for Milka chocolate bars resulted in 60 percent less weight and an elimination of 5.7 –million pounds of packaging material per year.

The type of material used for the packaging also plays a role. To this end, Kraft Foods is finding ways to increase the recycled content and recyclability of the packaging for its products, including:

• In the U.K., Kraft Foods recently began selling Kenco coffee in refill bags to complement glass jars. The refill bags use 97 percent less packaging material by weight than a new jar and less energy to produce.

• In North America, Kraft Foods recently changed its Maxwell House, Yuban, and Nabob coffee brands from steel cans to composite paperboard that weighs 30 percent less, uses 50 percent recycled content, and is expected to eliminate 8.5 million pounds of packaging.

Kraft Foods recycles nearly 90 percent of its manufacturing waste, so it makes sense to help consumers boost their own recycling rates.

• In the U.S., consumer recycling rates are only 33 percent, versus nearly 70 percent in other parts of the world. In 2008, to help increase recycling rates in the U.S., Kraft Foods began partnering with RecycleBank, a company that rewards consumers for recycling. The more recycling consumers do, the more reward points they have to redeem. Kraft Foods has helped people recycle more than 400,000 tons of material.

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