Ecostore's sugarcane-derived packaging a winner

Ecostore's Pat Durham accepts the award, while Tony Morpeth looks on, at the NZI National Sustainable Business Network Awards.

Ecostore's commitment to replacing the packaging of 98 per cent of its bottled products with new, sugarcane-based bottles has scored the company the accolade for Mega Efficiency Innovation at the NZI Sustainable Business Network Awards.

The new packaging material will be sourced from Bonsucro-certified sugarcane ethanol suppliers. Bonsucro is an international not-for-profit initiative established to reduce the environmental and social impacts of sugarcane production around the world, promoting sustainable business operations and workers' rights.

Bonsucro certifies products derived from sugarcane - including ethanol from Brazil, used to create the likes of Ecostore's plastics - to assure consumers that their purchase comes from an environmentally and socially responsible source.

As of November this year, Bonsucro has certified 3.7 per cent of global land under sugarcane. It has stakeholders in over 20 countries and is likely to expand further yet as the demand for sugar HDPE increases.

A defining characteristic of the plastic created from sugarcane ethanol is it has not been made from petrochemicals like traditional plastics.

Factory manager Tony Morpeth, who accepted the Mega Efficiency Innovation award on Ecostore's behalf, says the business's new plastic will allow them to reduce their environmental impact greatly.

"This sugar PE and the technology that we're putting into our plastic means just on our current volumes we're saving 29 tonnes of plastic per annum, let alone the carbon saving by converting."

Morpeth adds that this is a great direction for ecostore to be taking, and other companies should look to this as an example.

"The reason why great companies become successful over a long period of time is because they take a long view on their business and their place on the planet. The planet here is to be left to our children's children, and we want to do everything we can to leave it in the best possible condition."

He believes the benefits of alternative products outweigh the relatively small initial expense.

"It's such a short-term cost variance that we believe it will start to balance itself up as petrochemical becomes more precious, and therefore increases in price. Cost aside, you've got to take that bold move when something better becomes available. Hopefully this will invoke other companies to follow the lead that we're setting."