What comes into your eyes when you take your steps into a supermarket in Hong Kong? It’s probably everything about plastic packaging. Plastic wrapping on vegetables is so common. Fresh fruits are often seen to be in individual pieces of plastic and polyfoam packaging. To some retailers and supermarket chains, plastic wrapping and polyfoam packaging are necessary to help increase the shelf life of fresh fruits and vegetables. Some stores insist that it appears difficult for them to look for alternatives to keep the produce fresh. While to some consumers, the plastic wrapping is something to help keep food hygiene.
The Campus Sustainability Office arranged a collection exercise in September 2019 and invited the University community to drop their unwanted foam nets and polyfoam packaging items into special collection boxes. Collected packaging materials were then directed to Missing Link – Polyfoam Recycling Scheme. It was surprising to see the quantities of packaging items collected, but it might be just the tip of the iceberg if we imagine what’s going on in the city and around the world.
Shoppers have been ‘trained’ for years to see fruits and vegetables nicely wrapped and displayed in plastic trays and packaging. But the costs are high, for us as well as the environment. We often see excessive plastic wrap and polyfoam packaging irrespective of the actual needs. Such packaging has no direct connection to the fresh produce inside, and is often difficult to recycle in the conventional way. In fact, we can require less or no packaging and take environmentally motivated choices when we shop. By avoiding plastic, we are more likely to enjoy produce in its raw and natural state, fresh, ripe and seasonal without jeopardising our environment. We may not cut out plastic packaging entirely in just one second, but we can always look at where it can be gradually reduced and discouraged.
