Constantia Flexibles – the world’s third largest producer of flexible packaging with headquarters in Vienna, Austria – has opened the world’s first plant designed to produce more sustainable and recyclable flexible packaging only, in India. Production focus at the plant lies on the more environmentally friendly packaging family EcoLam. The official opening of the first of this kind site will take place on November 20, in Ahmedabad, Gujarat,

The reduction of waste in general and plastic waste in particular is an important issue, also for the food processing and home and personal care industry in India. The Indian government is responding to the problem and therefore adopted ‘Plastic Waste Management Rules’ as early as in 2016. Among other things, the rules prescribe to scrap single-use plastic like pouches completely by the year 2022. Another part of the new regulations is the phasing out of multi-layered plastic, which is non-recyclable.

Alexander Baumgartner, CEO of Constantia Flexibles: “We know about our responsibilities towards the industry, the end consumers and – first and foremost – towards the environment. Thus, we are not only focusing on developing more environmentally friendly packaging, we also designed the first plant in the world dedicated to produce sustainable packaging only. The plant named Constantia Ecoflex Ahmedabad is located in Gujarat in India, which is the perfect market to implement such a forward-looking project.”

Sustainable packaging only at the new plant in Ahmedabad
The decision to open a plant in India was relatively straightforward. Amongst others, the new ‘Plastic Waste Management Rules’ show, that Indian government can exert pressure on the recycling economy and that it supports initiatives and companies which advocate for less waste.

The solutions produced at the new plant all belong to the innovative product family EcoLam, which is part of Constantia Flexibles’ innovative product line Ecolutions.

EcoLam is a lightweight Mono-PE laminate suitable for a great variety of packaging applications. Due to its mono-material structure it is fully recyclable, and its carbon footprint is approximately 32% lower than that of comparable products. The EcoLam family comes in different barrier grades (EcoLam, EcoLamPlus, EcoLamHighPlus) to deliver the barrier needs for a diverse range of products.

After a construction time of more than two years, Constantia Ecoflex Ahmedabad started test runs in September 2019. The plant has an area of 24,500 sqm, currently there are 50 people working at the plant, the number is expected to triple by the second quarter of 2020.