In July 2026, in a world with a higher preference for single-use plastics in every industry for enhanced convenience, paperisation has become the most talked-about debate in every packaging industry gathering globally.
Paper has an impressive 87% recycling rate across Europe, and is derived from a resource that, if managed responsibly, is renewable. Consumers tend to view it as a “green” choice. A survey by Pro Carton, the European Association of Carton and Cartonboard Manufacturers, found that 72% of UK consumers prefer cartonboard or cardboard packaging over plastic.
Various packaging industries are also pushing themselves away from plastic regulators. The European Commission’s Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation (PPWR) will apply from August this year, and mandates higher rates of recycled content within packaging, full recyclability, and restricts harmful substances, such as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS).
Rob Wilson, a senior director at sustainability-focused management consulting firm Systemiq, leads the organisation’s advisory work on fibre-based packaging. “A lot of our brands want to know about paperisation. It’s a priority topic for most of them,” he says, not least because many have set public targets around plastic reduction.
A 2023 report by a coalition of environmental groups has described paper-based food packaging as a “false solution” due to the packaging waste crisis, and also because of the addition of coatings and composites, making them more difficult to recycle. Manufacturing of corrugated cardboard contains high levels of recycled content, whereas most food packaging uses virgin fibre.
Jamie Stone, a design and sustainability partner at UK-based PA Consulting, says that staying loyal to sustainable options such as paper and fiber is also accompanied by complex challenges. To store and pack wet or oily products, barrier coatings are made from plastic to prevent leakage and also preserve the quality of the product within. Creating effective coatings using recyclable or biodegradable materials is “nightmarishly hard”.
On the sourcing side, although paper or fibre-based packaging often carries sustainability certifications – from the Forestry Stewardship Council (FSC), for example – these seals of approval are not all created equal. The integrity of the Sustainable Forestry Initiative (SFI), a certifying non-profit organisation formed by the pulp and paper industry in the 1990s, has recently been accused by environmental groups of certifying clear-cut forests in Canada. (SFI responded to Corporate Knights that “while SFI set the standard, independent, third-party-accredited certification bodies certify organisations to the SFI standards.)
A category of fibre-based packaging that has gone through various iterations of innovation is the bottle. For example, Carlsberg first introduced a fibre-based beer bottle in 2022, and Coca-Cola began trialling one in 2021. The testing to find an ideal design that works practically and doesn’t compromise on sustainability also helps the brand to grow. “People have been trying to make paper bottles for 10 or 15 years,” says Stone. Why is it taking so long to find a technology that works, and to commercialise it? The answer isn’t straightforward – effective barrier coatings are one major sticking point – but Stone and his team are behind what he believes to be a breakthrough: dry moulded fibre (DMF).
Stone is the co-founder of The Bottle Collective, an initiative jointly convened by PA Consulting and Sweden-based Pulpac, to scale bottles made of DMF. “99.9% of all fibre packaging you’ve ever met is what’s called wet moulded fibre, very similar to when you’re at school and you did papier mache,” explains Stone. Fibers are combined with water to create a thick slurry, which is slowly formed into a shape via a dunking tool. The egg box and fruit punnet trays, along with meat trays, are perfect examples of packaging made from wet-moulded fibre. Stone mentions that the method is largely unpatented. It is also water and energy-intensive.
The initial slurry mixture is around 99% water and 1% fibre. Overall water use can vary depending on the production method, but some sources estimate that approximately 5,000 litres of water in total is required to produce 1 metric ton of packaging, using the wet moulded method. Then, in order to create the finished product, the water needs to be dried off, which takes time and energy. The result? “Costs that are not very competitive,” says Stone. “Dry moulded fibre was invented to fix all that.”
The technology involves a commodity item available from paper mills known as “fluff pulp,” which is further shredded down to a substance that is found in a nappy, says Stone. Then the next step involves squashing the material with the help of heat and pressure to transform it into its final shape. The whole procedure doesn’t require water, nor is it energy-intensive drying after forming.
31 July 2026
30 July 2026
30 July 2026
30 July 2026