The takeaway packaging will consume about 2.31 million tonnes in 2018

In recent years, the vigorous development of the Internet take-out market has brought great convenience to people's life, but the ensuing large-scale take-away packaging has caused a heavy burden on the environment.

According to the "Research Report on Third-party Catering Delivery Market in China 2016" released by Bida Consultation, in 2016, the largest single user of take-out in China was 16-20 yuan, accounting for 33.6% of the total, while the single users consuming 11-30 yuan accounted for 83.1%. Based on the above assumptions, the average spending per unit is 20 yuan. In 2018, there will be a total of 33 billion single orders, with an average of about 70 grams for each takeaway package and about 2.31 million tons for takeaway packaging in 2018.

Take-out packaging mainly includes lunch boxes, cutlery and bags. Lunch boxes are mainly divided into foam lunch boxes, paper lunch boxes and other general categories. Among them, the low price of the foam lunch box is more common in some small vendors; the overall pollution of the paper lunch box is serious and the price is high; the process of using the lunch box may absorb moisture; the ordinary plastic lunch box gradually becomes the market due to the advantages of low cost, simple production and good performance of mainstream. 

Ordinary plastic lunch boxes, tableware is the main component of EPS, which is non-degradable common plastics and one of the major pollutants that cause "white pollution." So, in our daily life, we should pay more attention to the EPS recycling.

In the future, the development of biodegradable plastic takeaway and courier packaging materials is one of the fundamental ways to solve the growing "white pollution" problem. Biodegradable plastics are polymers that undergo biodegradation under the action of microorganisms in nature (bacteria, fungi, etc.). The final product is carbon dioxide, water and other environmentally friendly small molecules. Currently, these types of materials are not widely used in takeaway packaging and courier packaging.

For the sustainable development of the environment, promote the application of biodegradable plastics is the trend of the times, and foam containers recycling is also a good way. The government should play an active role in policies, regulation, publicity and market guidance, and should comprehensively use tax incentives and economic subsidies to support the development, production and sales of biodegradable plastic packaging materials.