There has been a lot said about reducing plastic packaging for fresh produce, many countries are bringing in new legislation to reduce or even ban plastic packaging in the industry. Allfresh Wholesale in Ireland has been working towards this for a couple of years, on products such as peppers, bananas, celery, cherry tomatoes, herbs, and more recently avocados and grapes.
"We supply mainly catering customers, why do they need plastic packing on the produce?" said Barra Sweetnam owner at Allfresh. "We stopped doing the tri-colour packs of peppers a couple of years ago and now sell them individually and loose mixed, we make up mixed orders for customers. It does involve a bit more labour, but we have used 97,680 fewer plastic packs so far. We have also been selling grapes loose, this one is not as easy, but if we can get 50% of our customers to transition then that is still a step forward. In 2024 we sold 8798 boxes x 10 packs of avocados all packaged, we now sell them loose doing away 87,980 plastic packets. Celery and herbs are among other lines we are trying to go plastic-free on. Not all of our customers want this, but if we can lose the packaging on some of it then that is good."
Examples of where Allfresh has removed or reduced plastic packaging
Mixed peppers: 9768 Boxes x 10packs = 97680 less plastic packs, bananas: 5000 boxes x 20packs per box = 10,000 plastic bags, rhubarb: 850 boxes x 10packs = 8500.00 less plastic packs, beans: 6500 boxes x 3 = 19500 less plastic packs, mangetout & sugar snaps: 3755 boxes x 3 = 11,265 less plastic packs. Tenderstem broccoli: moved from 200g packs to mainly 1kg, 11671 kgs x 5 packs = 58355 less plastic. The list goes on bringing the total reduction in plastic packs to 666,656.
Under the 'Naked' campaign Allfresh is aiming to have a million plastic-free packs.
"We have to go to our suppliers and ask for plastic-free products, this is a challenge as some work with barcodes. For us as a wholesaler we don't use barcodes, we educate our employees to know the products and weigh them. Our competitors are the big multinationals, they have to work with bar codes as everything is scanned in and scanned out."
As a business owner, Barra has always tried to be sustainable, promoting local produce where possible. "Of course, this is not always realistic, we can't grow everything in Ireland, we have to import, but if we can lose the plastic here it makes a big difference, also for our customers. If they buy produce with plastic on they have to pay to get rid of it."
Barra said the main problem is that retailers sell nearly all fresh produce packaged in plastic because they also need the barcodes. "In France, they have banned the use of plastic packaging for fresh produce and sales have fallen by 30%, this is not because people are consuming less. When consumers can buy loose produce, they only buy what they can use and are not buying, for example, a pack of five lemons when they know they only need two. The biggest win in this is a massive drop in food waste.
"We have reduced our plastic usage step by step, we have seen some loss due to inaccurate weighing and some damage to the product but, this is not much. We try to differentiate ourselves from the big boys in the business and we have gotten contracts to supply big hotels because of this. To take this further we need our customers to buy into it.
"But sustainability is not only about reducing plastic it's about buying local, buying Irish when possible, and buying with less carbon footprint eg. Spain rather than China. It's also about a sustainable future for all people, we need also look at where our products come from; are wages too low? Are workers being exploited? We didn't buy any Israeli produce in 2024. We also need to look at China peeled garlic; 13,247 kg is imported from there while only 648kg is imported from Spain, so only 4.6% from Europe. The reason for this is that it is dirt cheap. Can we get customers to take social responsibility and pay more for European?"
For more information:
Barra Sweetnam
Allfresh Wholesale
Tel: +353 21 4510526
barra@allfresh.ie
www.allfresh.ie