Industrial applications: regulatory issues and life cycle assessment of food packaging

Active and intelligent packaging (A&I), including antimicrobial packaging (AM), can provide several benefits to the quality and safety of food although its deliberate interaction with the food and/or its environment and the migration of substances could represent a food safety concern. Most active and intelligent concepts that are on the market in the USA and Australia could not be introduced in Europe due to lack of specific legislation. To face the problem, EU firstly adopted the Framework Regulation 1935/2004/EC in which active and intelligent packaging systems were included and in 2009 the Regulation 450/2009/EC set rules ad hoc for A&I materials and articles. Among factors encouraging advanced packaging choices is the need to reduce food waste and to optimize the use of raw materials. This fueled the implementation of “green” packaging technologies, which is leading to environmentally-friendly as well as sustainable packaging solutions. In this view, proper environmental assessment tools and methodologies are necessary in order to include a balanced vision of quality and health aspects with environmental considerations: Life Cycle Thinking (LCT) approaches represent the most suitable solution.