Does China’s Excessive Packaging Law impact your packaging?
by Jianhong Hu at 13:12 in Packaging, Emerging
What is Excessive packaging?
Excessive packaging, namely over-packaging or unnecessary packaging, describes a product that is wrapped by multiple layers of material, which is unnecessary or unwanted by the customers. The purpose of these extra layers of packaging might be for the protection or decoration of products. However, they can be a waste of resources and a source of pollution.
How does China's law regulate excessive packaging?
According to the amended Solid Waste Law in December 2020, producers must comply with mandatory standards for product packaging. The standards give three technical requirements of packaging specification, such as:
- the limited amount of package layers,
- empty space ratio, and
- the packaging cost percentage of the total price for different product categories.
If the packaging does not satisfy any one of the requirements, it will be determined as excessive packaging and will be subject to a fine.
Please note: a draft amendment of the standards was released and is expected to be official soon.
Apart from the primary packaging, China introduced a legal framework for e-commerce packaging. A voluntary labelling scheme for green shipping packaging was introduced in October 2020. This certification system is meant to identify and promote reusable and recyclable shipping packaging.
Also, the prevention of excessive packaging is mentioned in the latest Ministry of Transport Order. Although no specified standards are given, it is reported that a technical standard, Requirements of restricting excessive packaging – the Express industry, is being composed.
We are expecting from the trend that excessive packaging regulations will be stricter with a series of upcoming new standards. To comply with China's excessive packaging regulations and laws, please consult Lorax EPI for more details.
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