Translated material
Yogurt in polystyrene
To stimulate the use of recyclables in food packaging, you need to remove regulatory barriers.
At the same time, none of us wants to be poisoned due to the fact that, for example, a glass of yogurt will contain toxic substances from the "previous" lives of plastic. On the one hand, a cyclic economy, on the other, the safety of our health.
If you think that only our safety of food packaging is placed higher than the possibility of saving resources, then you are mistaken.
In Switzerland, in order to be able to produce food packaging from recyclables, it is necessary to ensure the purity of this recycling of the corresponding level. Currently, polystyrene cups from yogurts are ordered to be thrown into mixed waste. In rare places, these waste can be handed over to the reception points or to the garbage bag for light packaging.
Experts say that polystyrene is well succumbing to sorting on lines and processing, but in order to make a polystyrene glass again from the polystyrene cup, such a package must be collected in a separate stream. Those. It is not enough to sort on the line all polystyrene. For food packaging, it is precisely the food PS. And this is already much more complicated and more expensive, and working with the population is required.
In 2023, the Migros supermarket network plans to start such projects.
It will be interesting to follow how they do it.