OSI’s Turosi Marches Forward with Sustainable Packaging Initiative to Meet 2025 Targets

July 24, 2020

In April 2018, the Australian Federal Government established “2025 national packaging targets'' to create a new sustainable pathway for companies to manage packaging in Australia. These ambitious targets were set to reduce the amount of waste generated and make it easier for product packaging to be recycled. One year later, Turosi, an OSI joint venture in Australia, published five sustainability commitments that aligned with those national packaging targets and established a strong foundation for the success Turosi is seeing in its packaging operations today.

Through the government’s 2025 national packaging targets, Australia is working toward ambitious national goals: by 2025 the government aims for all packaging to be reusable, recyclable or compostable, and for 70 percent of plastic packaging to be recycled or composted. It also aims for packaging to include 30 percent of average recycled content and to phase out problematic and unnecessary single-use plastics packaging.

Responding to the Call of Sustainable Packaging

In late 2019, Turosi began clarifying the sustainability role its team would play and set in motion a five-point plan to measure the company’s current packaging usage, set targets, explore alternatives, develop action plans and measure progress. Today, that plan is taking shape and Turosi is now measuring its packaging usage per kilogram for some of its major customers, which has opened up even more opportunities to seek sustainability solutions. 

Additionally, Turosi has embarked on a project with one of its major retail customers, working with them to replace the traditional cardboard cartons used for supplying primary poultry products and implementing the use of reusable plastic crates. By engaging in this partnership,

Turosi has an opportunity to eliminate more than 800 metric tons of cardboard material each year.

Trials will take place in August 2020 with the goal of implementing the full program in early 2021. Should the program be successful, Turosi will reduce the amount of overall packaging supplied to the customer by 29 percent in volume and eliminate 88 percent of the overall cardboard packaging volume with this customer.

In the current pilot, Turosi will utilize reusable, rather than recyclable, cartons to deliver products. Trials will take place in August 2020 with the goal of implementing the full program in early 2021. Should the program be successful, Turosi will reduce the amount of overall packaging supplied to the customer by 29 percent in volume and eliminate 88 percent of the overall cardboard packaging volume with this customer.

These reusable plastic crates, which are made of food grade high impact copolymer polypropylene or an approved equivalent, are already considered a better environmental alternative to recycled cardboard cartons and serve another purpose at the end of their life cycle. A crate can be ground up and used to manufacture non-food grade products.

While Turosi’s sustainability packaging efforts are worthwhile for the positive environmental impacts alone, they also drive towards the company’s mission: to be an indispensable supplier and partner, putting the customer at the center of everything that it does. The company believes it can help customers understand, mitigate and manage sustainability challenges by aligning their sustainability journeys. Because of this, Turosi is more conscious of its customers’ priorities and can challenge others within the market to advance their sustainable packaging efforts as well.

Turosi is Working to Leave the Environment Clean for the Next Generation

Turosi’s environmental commitment guides the company in doing its part toward reducing waste both within its operation and that of its customers. To achieve this goal, Turosi is employing some basic internal strategies to work towards a sustainable future.

Turosi’s sustainability action plan identifies the areas on which it needs to focus in the short term and future to reduce waste and energy use as much as possible, and send as little waste as possible to landfill. The company, though, knows an ambitious goal such as this one requires a cultural shift within the company.

Turosi employees will be guided and trained in ways to become more sustainable. They will be shown how a change in attitude towards sustainability and the choices they make in their work environment can make a difference. The company is leading education programs designed to highlight ways to achieve sustainability goals. They will also work with major trading partners on projects involving sustainability.

Sustainability Stays on Track Amid Global Challenges and Uncertainty

While the COVID-19 pandemic and its impacts on business have been felt around the world, Turosi has made it a priority to continue with its sustainability initiatives. The company continues to devote time and energy to seek positive outcomes. During the beginning of 2020, it even doubled down on its sustainable packaging initiative by inviting a major plastics supplier to do a sustainability audit on its plastic usage, with a view to delivering against the 2025 targets.

It is true that the pandemic has impacted OSI and its business around the world. But sustainability is a precompetitive issue at OSI. No matter what challenges arise, the company continues to maintain its responsibility as an industry leader, and that means remaining steadfast in advancing sustainability goals that will have lasting impacts for generations to come.