Blue Skies, a fresh produce manufacturing company, will for the next two to three years oversee the piloting of five innovations to reduce dependence on plastic in its supply chain. The piloting and trials, when successful, will lead to the commercialisation and knowledge transfer of the innovation to other industry players under the Fresh Produce Impact Hub- (FRESHPPACT) project. These innovations include the use of food waste such as coconut coir as mulch on farms, custom built machinery to improve mulch collection process, biodegradable workwear, plant based as well as paper-based packaging materials. FRESHPPACT, funded by the UKAid, has a mission of bringing together industry and research partners to find transformative solutions to social and environmental challenges, including plastic pollution that exist within fresh produce supply chains of developing or emerging economies. It has a consortium of members, which has the Centre for Sustainable Business Practices (CSBP) at the University of Northampton as the Coordinating Research and Project Management Partner. In an interview with the Ghana News Agency (GNA) at a Stakeholder engagement to address plastic waste menace in Ghana, Mr Simon Derrick, Head of Sustainability, Blue Skies, said the project provided the Company with the opportunity to have all the expertise to solve environmental challenges. He said the Company was seeking to do better as ‘currently 100 per cent of packaging are recyclable with 30 per cent of plastic made up of recycled content.’ ‘This is a Research and Development hub for the industry that will have an impact and obviously going to help us in terms of our ambition and benefit the wider interest in Ghana,’ he said. Mr Nashiru Salifu, Deputy Director in charge of Science Technology and Innovation at the Ministry of Environment Science Technology and Innovation (MESTI) highlighted the need for investment and stakeholder collaboration to complement policies on environmental sustainability. He said the industry needed to regard environmental sustainability as a long-term goal that guaranteed sustained operations and as a better trade off to short term profits, hence the need for investment in environmentally viable solutions. Dr Ebenezer Laryea, Associate Professor in International Sustainable Development Law at University of Northampton made a clarion call on industries to take charge of managing the plastic menace in the country. That, he said, will require the adoption of commercially viable and environmentally friendly innovations. ‘If that doesn’t happen, we will be in a position where we will be questioning if we succeed on this (curbing plastic waste),’ he said.
Source: Ghana News Agency
