ICA to save 217 km of plastic foil by laser marking its organic avocados

Swedish supermarket chain ICA is going to eliminate millions of packaging units by having its organic fruits and vegetables laser marked, rather than packed in plastic foil or having stickers applied.

Nature & More, the ‘trace and tell’ trademark of international distributor of fresh organic and fair fruits and vegetables Eosta, is going to mark ICA-bound organic fruits and vegetables with Natural Branding.

Natural Branding is a natural, safe, contactless and eco-friendly manner of branding a piece of fruit or vegetable by creating an image on the peel. A high-definition, low-energy, CO₂ laser removes pigment from the outer layer of the skin of the product. The peel is heated very locally, causing the pigment in pinpoint locations to vaporise. This only affects the top cell layers. 

This marking can be applied to practically all fruits and vegetables, especially avocado, sweet potato, ginger, mango, apples and coconut. Unfortunately, citrus fruits and pomegranates cannot be marked this way because in these fruits the peel restores itself and the pigment comes back automatically.

The first organic products that will be sold with Natural Branding by ICA are avocados and sweet potatoes. Just on avocados alone, this will eliminate at least 725,000 packaging units in the coming year.

Organic avocados in supermarkets are usually packed in plastic foil because they must be distinguished from conventional avocados that are sold in bulk. The supermarkets want to prevent organic avocados from being weighed and paid for as conventional, due to the price difference. The same goes for sweet potatoes, apples and many other organic products. Stickers can be an alternative, but the problem is that they come off and use paper, glue, ink, etc. 

Nature & More expects to save a lot of plastic and energy with Natural Branding. In 2015, Eosta sold 725,380 packs of avocados to ICA. To pack them, 217 km of plastic foil were used, at a width of 30 cm. Measured in weight, this is 2042 kg of plastic. Measured in CO₂, it is equivalent to an average car driving 1.3 times around the world.

Laser labels were approved by the European Union in 2013. The technology, originally patented in 1997, has been in use in Australia and New Zealand since 2009.