Shinsegae Food's 'Eco-Friendly Ice Pack' Wins Grand Prize at Green Packaging Contest

Development of Eco-Friendly Ice Packs Made from Sugarcane Pulp, Biodegradable Film, and Water
100% Natural Decomposition, Waste Reduction, and Reusability Earn Top Eco-Friendly Ratings
Accelerating Packaging Development to Grow as a Must-Environment Company

[Asia Economy Reporter Lee Seon-ae] The “eco-friendly ice pack” developed by Shinsegae Food won the grand prize, the Minister of Environment Award, at the 10th Green Packaging Contest.

According to Shinsegae Food on the 24th, the Green Packaging Contest is an event hosted by the Korea Environmental Packaging Promotion Institute and sponsored by the Ministry of Environment. It has been held since 2011 to encourage the development of excellent eco-friendly packaging technologies and designs that contribute to resource saving and green growth.

In this contest, Shinsegae Food submitted an eco-friendly ice pack made by applying biodegradable films such as “sugarcane pulp,” a non-wood pulp, and “PLA (Poly Lactic Acid)” and “PBAT (Polybutylene Adipate-co-Terephthalate),” which are 100% naturally decomposable biodegradable resins, and won the grand prize, the Minister of Environment Award. Most ice packs used in the market are made of synthetic resin and take more than 100 years to decompose underground, but the eco-friendly ice pack developed by Shinsegae Food naturally decomposes underground in only three months.

In addition, by replacing the filler “SAP (Super Absorbent Polymer),” which is not recyclable and used inside ice packs, with water, Shinsegae Food has reduced about 1,100 tons of filler waste annually.

Functionally, unlike existing paper ice packs whose surfaces easily get wet or contaminated making reuse difficult, Shinsegae Food’s eco-friendly ice pack surface is treated with a water-soluble water-repellent coating that blocks moisture evaporation and external contamination, enabling reuse.

Shinsegae Food’s eco-friendly ice packs are currently used to deliver frozen and refrigerated ready meals ordered from major online malls such as SSG.com, 11st, and Gmarket.

A Shinsegae Food official said, “This award recognizes the high technological capability of Shinsegae Food’s eco-friendly, next-generation packaging materials developed so far,” and added, “As contactless consumption increases due to the prolonged COVID-19 pandemic and packaging waste problems become increasingly serious, we will take the lead in developing packaging materials to grow into an essential eco-friendly company beyond just eco-friendliness.”

Meanwhile, in 2018, Shinsegae Food submitted a 100% naturally decomposable banana packaging material at the 8th Green Packaging Contest and won the grand prize, the Chairman’s Award of the Korea Environmental Packaging Promotion Institute. This packaging material not only has eco-friendly elements but also has the advantage of maintaining the freshness of bananas for a long time, and it is currently used as the packaging for bananas sold at Starbucks.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.