The EU’s new Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation, PPWR, has shifted the goalposts. At Arla, 90 per cent of packaging innovation is now focused on regulatory compliance – not sustainability in the traditional sense.
What was once a matter of sustainability targets and consumer convenience is increasingly becoming a prerequisite for selling products on the market at all. That is the conclusion when Rob Clark, Senior Business Development Manager for Packaging Innovation at Arla, surveys the regulatory landscape in the EU.
“A product can be banned from the market, so this is extremely important,” Clark tells Mejerimedier’s international publication Danish Dairy & Food Industry.
The PPWR (Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation) sets requirements for packaging design, recyclability and recycled content. Where a packaging format fails to comply, the issue triggers a process of supplier negotiations, material changes and, in some cases, adjustments to filling machinery at the dairies themselves.
Hundreds of formats to be reviewed
At Arla, preparations have been under way for two years. The company sells many thousands of products across Europe and has many hundreds of packaging formats to be assessed one by one against the new requirements.
Clark emphasises that PPWR should not be read as an outright ban on plastic. The direction of the legislation is rather to improve it – for instance by reducing fossil-based inputs, increasing recyclability and simplifying material structures towards mono-material packaging.
“The legislation is not saying, ‘You can no longer use plastic.’ Instead, the legislation is saying: make plastic better,” Clark tells Danish Dairy & Food Industry.
He also notes that Denmark lags behind several other European countries, both in terms of EPR systems and recycling infrastructure. One of the ambitions of PPWR is precisely to reduce this kind of fragmentation by harmonising rules across the EU.
Read the full article in our international publication Danish Dairy & Food Industry 2026.
By Maja Løvstrup
Photo: Arla Foods
