CGF China has released the "Consumer Goods Industry Sustainable Packaging Management System and Best Practice Case Study Booklet," in collaboration with SynTao. This initiative involved contributions from CGF members such as Danone, Haleon, Mengniu, Nestlé, Mondelēz, and Colgate-Palmolive. The booklet, unveiled during the 2024 CGF China Day in April, outlines a comprehensive roadmap for consumer goods companies to facilitate the transition to sustainable packaging.

The sustainable packaging transition presents new challenges and opportunities for consumer goods companies amidst the global trend of actively combating climate change, reducing environmental pollution, and preserving biodiversity. It also enables industrial companies to better respond to the growing ESG investments. In this context, the CGF Golden Design Rules (GDRs) were introduced in China three years ago to help companies accelerate their progress towards using less and better plastic through recyclable packaging design.

However, there are still challenges facing consumer goods companies in applying the GDRs and implementing packaging management due to low awareness and a lack of strategic thinking. This year’s booklet is developed to provide an industry-wide universal roadmap, action framework, and best practices for sustainable packaging management, aiming to inspire and engage more companies in the consumer goods industry to accelerate the sustainable packaging transition.

For the first time, "Sustainable Packaging" was defined with the publication of the booklet. Sustainable packaging fulfills essential functions throughout the entire product lifecycle, employs recyclable design, utilizes recoverable and renewable raw materials, minimizes resource and energy consumption, and mitigates any potential harm to human health and the ecological environment. Ultimately, it enhances net welfare benefits derived from production and economic activities.

The booklet introduced a universal roadmap for sustainable packaging management, which comprises seven steps:

1. Identifying risks and opportunities
2. Setting targets and strategies
3. Developing the approaches
4. Establishing management structure and mechanisms
5. Conducting comprehensive benefits analysis
6. Disclosing information
7. Cooperating with external stakeholders to facilitate comprehensive transformation

The booklet also introduced a practical action framework for sustainable packaging management, defining five aspects, ten first-tier, and nineteen second-tier management indicators to guide companies to take actions and gradually strengthen their sustainable packaging management performance.

Best of all, the booklet proposed a comprehensive indicator system to assess sustainable packaging performance from environmental, economic, and social values, thus more effectively facilitating decision-making on sustainable packaging investment.

The booklet showcased the best practices from Danone, Haleon, Mengniu, Nestlé, Mondelēz, and Colgate-Palmolive, demonstrating how leading companies incorporate sustainable packaging into their company strategies and target-setting. Through establishing effective packaging management systems and partnering with stakeholders, these leading companies achieve cost reduction and efficiency increase in packaging management, as well as create shared value with the environment and society.