Dow, local partners to jointly target plastic waste issue

The tie-up follows a suite of local partnerships as Dow turns the concept of circular economy into reality. Last year, Dow and Mengniu, China's leading dairy company, announced the successful commercialization of a shrink film made with Dow's PCR resin in Mengniu's product packaging.

Among the first for the food and beverage industry in the Asia-Pacific, the newly formulated one-pellet resin is 100 percent recyclable and will be used in Mengniu's secondary packaging for dairy products.

Dow, with its strategic recycling partners, utilizes domestic plastic waste collected from milk, water and juice bottles, as well as a discarded flexible film within China, and transforms it into PCR resin.

Specifically, the PCR resin is incorporated into the core layer of the collation shrink film and performs comparably to conventional options made with traditional resins.

The introduction of such recycled content in secondary packaging lets brand owners like Mengniu reduce carbon footprints and reconstruct used plastics so as to not let them add to existing plastic waste, according to Candra.

"After constructing China's first-ever 'plastic road' using recycled milk bottles, this initiative continues our trajectory to contribute to a circular plastics economy and close the loop by working with materials that are sustainable and recyclable," said Li Pengcheng, vice-president of Mengniu Dairy.

"In tandem, we hope to increase the use of recycled plastics, reduce greenhouse gas emissions and address the plastic waste issue in response to growing consumer concerns about the environment," Li said.