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  While the world has been suffering from COVID-19, the year of 2020 has come to an end. Many experts agree that the abnormal climate and the spread of infectious diseases are highly related to the imbalance of the environment. Each country in the world has reviewed the environmental issues and established enforceable and rational policies. China, especially, announced the regulation on disposable plastic products in January this year including the details of how they would proceed the policy over the next 5 years. As the country is the biggest plastic manufacturer and importer, the news excited the environmental groups, surprised the other countries and alerted the relevant industries.   China’s Task to Regulate the Plastic The amount of plastic packaging used by 1.4 billion people in China is more than we could imagine. Furthermore, as the family scale gets smaller with the internet and delivery service developed, the consumption of the relevant products has been soa...

  Since 2018, rePAPER has been publishing Newsletter once a month to share the information about the global trends moving towards the environment-friendliness in the food packaging industries, the major changes in policies and regulations of each country and internal news such as achieving certificates or introducing new products. While delivering the information through a Korean blog and newsletter for the domestic users, rePAPER has been sending an English version newsletter to the international partners and industries by email. It not only contains rePAPER’s technology and products that are recognized as the most optimized solution for its recyclability, home-compostability, and thermostability, also gives insight how each country and business move towards sustainability, rePAPER’s Newsletter has won great favors from readers. This time, rePAPER opened a new blog, especially for the international readers! Please check out our new blog and get the news more conveniently!

We can easily spot ‘biodegradable’ products anywhere these days. Due to the climate change and the pandemic resulted from the pollution, environment-friendly property of a product has influenced a customer’s purchase decision more than ever. Generally, the word ‘biodegrade’ means that a material is degraded or decomposed by microbes such as molds or bacteria. Paper, woods, flowers, fruits, and fish shall be the most common examples as biodegradable materials. However, did you know that a plastic cup, a diaper, and even metal can be degradable, too? The only problem would be that it takes decades or even centuries to be so. Although corrosion by light, wind, or water is also a part of decomposition, today we will focus on materials’ degradability occurred by temperature, oxygen, and microbes. First, let’s find out what these two familiar, but confusing words, ‘biodegradable’ and ‘compostable’ exactly mean! The Difference Between Degradable and Compostable As the environmental awaren...

The Ministry of Environment announced the Ban on Repacking on June 18 th in order to reduce the wasted resource by unnecessary packaging. However, there was strong backlash among the industries and consumers as it did not give a clear guide line on the subjects or conditions. Finally, the ministry decided to reexamine the issue and set the standards with more details. The department organized a consultative body with relevant industries, experts, and consumer groups since last July and released the revised guide line including the specific subjects on September 21 st . The Government is also planning to apply various policies to decrease the amount of packaging waste. Now, let’s find out more details about the ban on repacking enacted on January of 2021! Based on the subject list, it can be understood that the regulation focuses on the reduction of synthetic materials, which is plastic packaging. The Ministry of Environment gives a 3-month preparation period to the industries for ...

rePAPER obtained Home Compostable Certificate, signifying the highest level of organic recyclability, compostability, of a product. In 2017, rePAPER was granted for Industrial Compostable Certificate by DIN CERTCO, which is given to a product that satisfies strict and thorough global standards to prove its harmlessness by passing chemical analysis, biodegradation test, and ecotoxicity test. Believing in our environmentally friendly technology, rePAPER kept moving forward to achieve home compostable certificate, proving that our products do not require any special facilities but can be composted in a backyard. Consequently, we are now able to present our products as brand-new global standards to environmentally friendly packaging industry, completely distinguishable from the conventional ones.   Food Packaging vs Environment-friendly Food Packaging vs rePAPER’s Food Packaging Acknowledging the food packaging takes up the 2 nd largest portion of the marine waste, consumers in the wo...

  On June 18th, distributors and consumers were put in a great confusion. Articles were released saying the Repackaging Ban starting from the following month practically means that the Government would forbid discount promotions such as “Buy one, get one free”. The article bitterly criticized that the Korean would be the first country to ban on bundle discount in the world. Let’s keep reading to see what this controversial law exactly is and the true intention for it!   Why Ban on Repackaging? The repackaging ban law is to prohibit distributors from selling products after re-packaging. Packaging is primarily used to prevent a product from being destroyed or lost and to deliver a product’s information to a customer. As the excessive packaging has become a popular marketing form, however, the amount of waste has been soaring up. In order to resolve the waste issue, the Ministry of Environment carried forward the measures to prevent excessive packaging on January 14 th thi...

Do you remember when fresh-cut fruits and vegetables were first introduced? These products were considered as representatives that show the values that young generation prioritize the most, efficiency and convenience. Well, now customers go to a mart to purchase cuisine instead of choosing every ingredient. If you can’t find a time to go shopping, a few clicks will deliver delicious HMR foods right to your front door in the early next morning. What is HMR? Korea Agro-Fisheries& Food Trade Corporation, hereinafter aT, defined HMR (Home Meal Replacement) as ready-made products that can be served as a decent meal with simple steps of cooking. Depending on the necessity of cooking or heating, products are usually categorized into 3 groups, RTE, RTH, and RTC. Soaring HMR Market According to aT’s ‘Report on Segment of Processed Food’, the domestic HMR market size was reported to be 3.4 billion dollars in 2019. It is expected to continuously growing to over 4.1 billion dollars b...

As of June 22 nd , the number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 was reported to be more than 8.8 million with the death toll of 466,700 in the world. This novel virus is known to be originated from a wet market in Wuhan city in China last December and started to spread globally in March of 2020. The borders are closed and schools and industries get stopped.  Experts warn that a pandemic like COVID-19 could now occur anytime and turn into an endemic, which is a disease regularly found in a certain area. Therefore, they insist that it is important to bring changes on general awareness and system based on “One Heath” approach. How is the disease related to ecosystem? And what does this approach actually mean?   What is One Health System? CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) in the US explains One Health is an approach to recognize people’s health is closely connected to that of animals and the environment we share. It emphasizes that we should understand the interc...