The Essential Role of Packaging in Modern Society

Packaging has been integral to human civilization for millennia, evolving from rudimentary containers to sophisticated solutions. Today, its significance is ever-growing, driven by the need for efficient preservation and distribution of goods. Packaging is indispensable in modern life, with most foods and products reliant on it for distribution and sale.

One of the primary roles of packaging is to contain products in various quantities, making bulk purchases and individual sales feasible. Additionally, packaging serves as a powerful marketing tool. It is designed to advertise and promote both the product and its supplier, functioning as an independent selling mechanism. Attractive and informative packaging can influence consumer behavior and enhance brand recognition.

Protection is another crucial function of packaging. It safeguards products from physical damage, contamination, and environmental factors, ensuring that goods reach consumers in optimal condition. Packaging also maintains the integrity of storage mediums, whether they are liquids, gases, or solids. For instance, vacuum-sealed packaging preserves freshness and extends the shelf life of perishable items by preventing exposure to air and moisture.

Furthermore, packaging facilitates safe and efficient handling, transportation, and storage. It ensures that products are easy to move, stack, and store, which is vital for logistics and supply chain management. High-quality packaging also preserves the product's quality by preventing any interaction between the packaging material and the product, avoiding unwanted flavor or odor transfer.

Beyond its practical functions, packaging plays a crucial role in consumer identification and product differentiation. Well-designed packaging helps consumers quickly identify a product and understand its purpose, enhancing the overall shopping experience.

In summary, packaging is a multifaceted tool that extends far beyond mere functionality. Its roles in containment, promotion, protection, preservation, and logistics underscore its indispensable place in modern society.
The Essential Role of Packaging in Modern Society

Fair Packaging and Labeling Act

The two Acts which form the cornerstone for food labeling regulations in the USA are the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act (FDA), and The Fair Packaging and Labeling Act.

The Fair Packaging and Labeling Act (FPLA) 1966 standardized the labels of products and required that labels provide honest information. The FPLA relates only to the net quantity of contents information on packages, goods, or commodities that are sold on the basis of weight or measure.

These rules apply to all types of products, such as groceries, cosmetics, cleaners and chemicals. The FPLA requires that all packages of household consumer commodities, as defined by the Act, bear a label containing certain basic information about the nature source and contents of the commodity.

 

It is the responsibility of the consumer to compare weights and sizes of products available – a much easier job when accurate, standard information is available for comparison.

Amendments to the FPLA were passed in 1992. These laws require labels to include conversion of quantities into a metric measurement in additional to the US system of weights and measures.
Fair Packaging and Labeling Act

Packaging of food

Packaging has become an integral part of the processing, preservation, marketing and even the cooking of foods.

Initially, packages served simply to contain products and to protect them from outside contamination. However, there has been tremendous growth in the development and design of new packages to fit specific needs.

While there has been adaptation of many of the traditional packaging materials, e.g paper, glass, and metals (tin, steel, and aluminium), much of the growth has been due to development of plastic or flexible packaging materials.

Packaging materials may be composed of single component (usually one chemical substance polymeric, building block form) or they may be composed of multiple components, consisting of the variety of materials, usually laminated in layers, offering many advantages not provided by single components.
Packaging of food 

Packaging for meat

Food packaging constitutes the main tool by which produce could reach consumers from the production centers through distribution and commercialization.

The change from a butcher cutting and wrapping the meat in paper or waxed paper for direct sale to the purchaser to in-store cutting and packaging of meat for refrigerated self-service display cases required more advanced forms of meat packaging.

Fresh meat packaging contributes to keeping the freshness by controlling microbial or chemical alteration during their transport and display on retail, home storage, and up to preparation and serving.

Meat color is used more than any other quality factor in making meat purchase decisions, with color preference and consumer purchase untint highly related to discrimination against beef that is not read.

The production of muscle-based foods is necessary to ensure that such products reach the consumer in a condition that satisfies his or her demands on a number safety and convenience.

The packaging also should have an ability to deliver a product shelf life that will endure the stresses of handling, transportation, storage, sale and consumer contact.

There are four categories of preservatives packaging that can be used with raw muscle foods. These are:
*High oxygen modified atmosphere packs (high O2 MAP)
*Low oxygen modified atmosphere packs (low O2 MAP)
*Controlled atmosphere packs
*Vacuum packs

Generally, food packaging aims to maintain quality and protect hygiene during storage and transport. Modern meat packaging methods maintain a low microbial load whole optimizing the sensory quality of a product.
Packaging for meat

Packaging for tea

After the blending, the tea is sent to the packaging machines, where it is packaged either as individual tea bags or in bulk packages. The tea powder may be packaged in canister or jars.

Tea is hygroscopic and its ability to remain in good condition is highly dependent on its moisture content.

Therefore the main technical requirement for packaging of tea at any stage is the provision of an adequate moisture barrier.

For bulk tea, the traditional foil-lined plywood tea chest remains a common form of packaging for export tea.  The aluminium foil is used as a moisture barrier. Multiwall paper sacks laminated with foil and polyethylene are becoming more common, providing as superior moisture barrier and any physical damage to the tea can be minimized by palletizing within the factory and shipping on containers.

Loose tea is packed in a multitude of different shapes sizes and types of materials throughout the world. The most common being a paperboard carton with either an aluminium foil liner or an overwrap of PP or RCF.

The best for loose tea is probably a metal box with snap-lid.

Tea bags have now become the most popular form of retail packaging, and considerable development has gone into improving the tissues paper used for this type of packaged, with porous wet-strength paper being required.
Packaging for tea

Objective of packaging: Containment

Packaging and package labeling have several objectives. One of the objectives is: containment or agglomeration.

Containment or agglomeration - Small items are typically grouped together in one package for efficient handling. Liquids, powders, and granular materials need containment.

For example, a single box of 1000 pencils requires less physical handling than 1000 single pencils.

Containment also means keeping a number of different or the same items packed together and this applies to primary, secondary and tertiary packs.

Obviously, the package must keep its content secure between the end of the packaging line and the time when all the food has been eaten.

This function of packaging is so obvious to be overlooked by many, with the exception of large discrete products, all other products must be contained before they can be moved from one placed to another.

If leakage or loss occurs, the consequences can vary from a minor inconvenience to a major and potentially catastrophic incident.
Objective of packaging: Containment

What are the categories of food packaging?

In the most familiar form, a package is a simple box on the grocer’s shelf or the wrapper on a candy bar. Package can also be a wooden cart around a machine or a bulk container for industrial products.

The most significant properties are light weight, cushioning ability moisture resistance, ease of fabrication or molding, chemical inertness, non-abrasiveness, no dusting, thermal insulation, useful temperature range and competitive cost.

There are four broad categories of packages that require different technologies to satisfy the requirements of end user.

Consumer package
Consumer packaging that is market and is oriented and is directed to the consumer in the area of foods, soft goods, hard goods, materials for which there is an immediate need. It will be delivered to the ultimate consumer in the retail store.

Industrial package
The materials basically oriented as industrial products or items that will be sold directly to an industrial consumer. The packaging means for warehousing and distribution to the retail store.

Institutional package
Institutional packaging is a food packaging that is intended to be used in retail operations, restaurants, commissionaires and cafeterias and is intended to be manually handled.

Military package
Procures for use of military services
What are the categories of food packaging?

Hermetically sealed container

The preservation of food safety and quality in packaged foods depends on hermetically sealed packages.

The term hermetic refers to a container that is sealed completely against the ingress of gases and vapors. The package can be considered as an air or liquid tight container.

Such a container, as long as it remains intact, will also impervious to bacteria, yeasts, molds and dirt from dust and other sources.

The most common hermetic containers are rigid metal cans and glass bottles, although faulty closures can make them non-hermetic. Canned food can be defend as thermally processed shelf-stable foods in hermetically sealed containers, regardless of the type of container (metal, plastic, paper, etc) or how the thermal process was delivered.

The quality of the seal can readily be ascertained by coating the ampoule with a leak-detection compound or detergent solution, then pacing it in a bell jar of vacuum desiccators and evacuating. Any leaks present will result in an easily seen stream of bubbles.
Hermetically sealed container

Tinplate cans

Tin is the oldest available metals and centuries of use have established its non-toxic nature. Tinplate is the common term for a steel sheet with a protective coating of tin.

This combination of materials gives the following properties: a shiny, metallic appearance, formability, possessing a gas barrier, rigidity and providing adequate protection against corrosion and solderability.

Tinplate, the first material used to make metal cans and canisters, consists of a thin sheet of steel, coated with tin. The purpose of the tin coat is to reduce the risk of corrosion.

Modern tinplate for cans is produced from steel strip with tin applied by continues electro-deposition.

There are three can types:
*The three piece can evolved from original concept
*The two piece draw/redraw can
*The draw/wall-ironed can

The two main advantages of tinplate cans are that they are cheaper than aluminum cans and are also magnetic.

This latter feature enables tinplate cans to be transported through leak-testing baths on magnetized conveyor rather than magnetic pucks having to be individually fitted.
Tinplate cans

Two piece cans

Two piece cans is manufactured by press punching cups from sheets or coils of aluminum or steel. During this cupping operation, a blank is produced from the coil stock and in the same punch stroke, s formed into a shallow cup.

The cups are then forced though a series of rings to iron out and form a full-length can and to form the bottom dome.

Subsequent operations include trimming the can to a specified length, washing to remove drawing lubricants, decorating the exterior of the can with the desired brand level and applying coating to prevent contact of the food or beverage product with the metal substrate.

The product at this stage is a container with sides and a bottom representing one of the pieces of a two-piece can. The lid, secured and sealed after filling, is the second piece.

Since 1970, through the conversion of three to two piece cans and subsequent lightweighting, the weight of a 350 mL tinplate soft drink can has been reduced by 50% to 30g, and that of the inherently lighter two-piece aluminum can by 39% to 13 g.

It is evident that two-piece steel can would eliminate the long seam and one double seam and thus preclude two sources of potential leakage.

Steel is a cheaper metal than aluminum, but it is far more difficult to form. A two –piece steel can could offer the advantages of a two piece aluminum can, but at a lower price.

The two piece can has no side seam and only one double seam, which is more easily formed and controlled because of the absence of a side seam lap juncture.

Seaming by the filler at the top end is considerably easier owing to the absence of a junction of the side seam and the end seam.
Two piece cans

Heat sealing

Heat sealability is a critical property for many packaging applications.

Heat sealing technology is applied to packaging using thermoplastic materials, since heat seal technology can easily create bags from thermoplastic films, seal the bags, or fabricate bottles after heating and cooling them.

Heat seal properties are influenced by a polymer’s thermal and rheological properties as well as factor such as the following:
*Seal-bar temperature
*Seal-bar pressure
*Dwell time
*Sealing bar configuration
*Package design

When heated, thermoplastic polymers change from solid to a liquid and then return to the solid stated after cooling.

Thermoset polymers, the other main type of polymer, exhibit a low viscosity when heated. They then begin cross-linking and cannot subsequently be melted.

Heat seal technology is used for packaging pre-heated and sterilized foods, baby and family care products, injectable and oral medicines, snacks, toiletries and components of electronics and precision machines.

Most polymers used for heat-seal layers belong to polyolefin family such as low-density polyethylene (LDPE), ethylene copolymer, acid copolymer, ionomer and PP.

Hence, these polymers have a number of desirable characteristics such as low cost, high moisture resistance, high flexibility, low heat seal temperature, and ease of processing.
Heat sealing

Pouch packs

One of the most significant innovations in the last decade in the flexible packaging market has been the inexorable rose of the pouch pack.

Stand-up are one do the most important innovations to affect flexible packaging in recent years.

Pouch packs are convenient, have brand enhancement and are more environmental friendly, with a lower weight volume and less waste.

The laminates within the films sued for pouch construction depend on the application. The generations of pouches used for heat sterilization applications were 3 ply.

However, the current generations of pouches are more robust 4 ply constructions with an additional layer of nylon.

Correct material selection for the manufacture of pouches is of critical importance. Clearly defined performance characteristics for the finished pack should be agreed and be presented as an approved packaging specification.

The rise of on-the-go snacking and trends towards convenience eating means that the world market for pouches will continue to rise significantly.

Although pouch packs have been widely adopted in a variety of food connect applications, another sectors, including pet foods and household products, the demand for pouches has also also grown significantly.
Pouch packs

Nanoparticulates in food packaging

The future importance of nanoelectronics and ‘electro-nanotechnologies’ is sufficiently well recognized to have become the subject of industrial and government policy roadmaps.

Nanotechnology is conventionally defined by the crucial functional element being less than 10 - 20 nm in dimension, where the physical properties of solid materials themselves would drastically change. 

Nanotechnology can help to address packaging functions such as food protection and preservation, marketing and smart communications to consumers.

Applications of nano-biocomposites could help to provide new food packaging materials with improved mechanical, barriers, antioxidant, and antimicrobial properties.

Nanoscale-sensing devices are under development that, when attached to packaging, will enable the food or food ingredients to be traced back to the source to packaging.

New development is under way in this field include the so-called ‘electronic tongue’ technology that is made up of sensor arrays to signal condition of the food.

High barrier nano-conating consisting of hybrid organic and inorganic nano composite coating produced by the sol-gel process are being developed for oxygen-diffusion barriers for plastic such as PET.

The coatings have been reported to be very efficient at keeping out oxygen and retaining carbon dioxide, and they can rival traditional active packaging technologies such as oxygen scavengers.

Also under research is nanostructured silicon with nanopores for potential applications in food packaging, with the aim to enable detection of pathogens in food and variations of temperature during food storage. 

Nanoclay for example, they are imbedded on the matrix of the polymer. When they are freed, for instance when the packaging material is incinerated, they will be no more harmful than other clays that are deposited by rivers and the sea.

The development of new strategies for the use of nanocomposites in food materials has been the object of many studies.

The main risk of consumer exposure to nanomaterial from food packaging is likely to be through their potential migration into the packaged food.
Nanoparticulates in food packaging

Micro-porous film

Micro-porous films are defined as having a narrow pore-size distribution, usually in the sub-micrometer range although they can range from 0.1 to 10 um. It is common for micr0-porous films to have 1-2 billion pores per square centimeter in a film 10-50 um thick.

Modified atmosphere packaging (MAP) of fresh produce has been an active research area for many years. The problem is that most polymeric films are too impermeable for packaging high-respiring products like broccoli, cauliflower, carrots and cut fruit.

In order of achieving high rates of gas exchange is through the use of micro-porous and perforated films. The gas diffusion constant for a perforation is approximately 4 to 8 million times greater than that of a low-density polyethylene film.

Micro-porous films are prepared by extrusion of filler-containing polymers. The common fillers are CaCO2 or SiO2, although other porous powders may be included.

Gas permeability is controlled by adjusting the filler content, the particle size of the filler and the degree of stretching the film.
Micro-porous film

What is cellophane?

Cellophane means a thin, transparent cellulose material which his manufactured using the viscose process and used in food packaging, such as candy, cheese, and baked food. Other includes for fresh produce and processed meat.

It is also used as adhesive tapes, and membranes for industrial uses, such as batteries. It is an old material, flimsy and opaque and requires further treatments to render it transparent, soft and plastic. This treatment includes coating with metal or other chemicals to alter its permeability to air and water.

Cellophane has been produced since the 1930s. It is obtained by treating sulfite paper pulp with sulfur dioxide and carbon disulfide that transform the cellulose into a viscous material called viscosa. Then the viscose is extruded throughout a slit to form a sheet.

Cellophane was a favorite packaging material with potato chippers for many years. It provides sparkle and certain degree of ‘body’ to the package.

The disadvantage is that in the past it has been poor performance at low temperature and its limited shelf life. It will dry out under low humidity conditions cause package failure.

However the film is excellent for high moisture products as it allows for respiration and reduces fogging.
What is cellophane?

Nano food packaging

Several chemical companies are producing a nanotechnology transparent plastic film from packaging containing nanoparticles of clay.

Some nano packaging materials are designed to reduce gas such as oxygen and carbon dioxide and moisture exchange and UV light exposure or to emit antimicrobials and antioxidants, with the goals of keeping food ‘fresher’ for longer – or at least slowing deterioration.

If the oxygen gets into packaged food products, such as cheese or meat, it can reduce the freshness of foods, so it may no longer be safe to eat.

Bottles made with nano-composites minimize the leakage of carbon dioxide out of the bottle, increasing the shelf life of carbonated beverages without using heavier glass bottles or more expensive cans.

By reducing UV light exposure, the barrier technology will minimize the damage to food contained in transparent packaging. 

The nanoclay particles also makes the plastic lighter, stronger and more heat-resistant.

Nano packaging materials are also developed to interact with foods they contain such as the ability to ‘release nanoscale antimicrobials, antioxidants, flavors, fragrances or nutraceuticals into the food or beverage to extend its shelf-life or to improve its taste or smell’.

Nano packaging applications may provide a number of benefits for manufacturers including the capacity to keep packaged food edible for longer.

This may enable food to travel longer distances and to sit for extended periods in storage.
Nano food packaging

Definition of packaging

What is packaging? Packaging has been defined in many ways: Packaging is the art, science and technology of preparing products for market.

It is also can be defined as a product made from any material such as paper, glass, plastic, aluminum and wood that is used for the containment, protection, handling, delivery and presentation of goods from raw to processed goods.

Packaging ensures safe delivery of the product to the ultimate consumer in good condition at minimal overall cost. It is a system capable of containing the goods that it remains safe and efficacious within its shelf life. 

Packaging must protect what it sells and sell what it protects. Physical damage and chemical deterioration from mechanical and climatic hazards, as well as changes caused by microorganism must be prevented. 

Packaging is a techno-economic function aimed at minimizing costs of delivery while maximizing sales. It providing presentation, identification, information and convenience for the product from the moment of production until it is used or administrated.
Definition of packaging

Polymers for food packaging

The materials used in food packaging are very common polymers. Their permeability to gases and vapors is at the origin of their barrier properties and capacity for protection of the food.

Polymers or plastic packaging materials have increasingly replaced traditional materials such as metal, glass or paper in many food packaging applications because of their light weight and superior functionality.

Polymers properties affecting permeability, such as free volume, crystallinity, tacticity, cross-linking, orientation and thickness.

Polymers for food packaging may be in the from films and other flexible items, or in the form of rigid containers, such as clear drinks bottles or opaque cartons for dairy products.

Polymer will usually require good barrier properties, both to prevent loss of moisture from the food, and to prevent ingress of undesirable, possible odorous contamination from outside.

There are few examples of the most commonly used plastic polymers:
*Polyethylene
*Polypropylene
*Polystyrene
*Polyvinyl chloride

In general, food diffuses into plastic packaging, which enhances migration of unreacted monomers and potentially mobile additives form the plastic into the food.

Probably the two most important barrier polymers for food packaging are polyvinyllidene and ethylene vinyl alcohol, although other materials find important niches.
Polymers for food packaging

Objectives of Food Packaging

Packaging has become high tech; it is no longer just a box or a bag that gets a product into a supermarket and then home onto a consumer’s shelf.

For most food products, the main objective of food packaging is to ensure the safety of the product and preserve it in good condition for the anticipated shelf life.

The package should also minimize product losses (waste) throughout the food handling and distribution chain.

Food packaging is to hold the food quality – ideally in the condition in which it was prepared by the food manufacturer – until it is ready to be consumed. The quality of food is to be retained as much as possible during the time between period of release and time of use.

It requires a combination of properties and/or characteristics and although each recognized packaging material possesses some of these, sadly no one material possesses them all.

With a planned schedule of food production, storage and shipping time, the manufacturer have to design packaging method systems capable of delivering the food to the consumer with the level of acceptable quality expected by the consumer.
Objectives of Food Packaging