A chemical recycling technology partnership between Berry Global Group and Saudi Basic Industries Corp. will supply plastic packaging for Philadelphia-brand cream cheese starting in 2022.
In a June 2 announcement, snack food maker Mondelez International, which owns the Philadelphia brand, said it will start to use the recycled resins as part of its goal to have 5 percent recycled plastic in its packaging.
In statements, the companies did not disclose details of the amount of materials from the chemical recycling collaboration. Chicago-based Mondelez said the resin would be used in packaging sold in Europe.
Sabic and Berry announced a partnership in November to use chemical recycling technologies to develop polyolefins made from low-quality mixed plastic waste at a new "semicommercial" scale Sabic facility in the Netherlands.
"Innovations like advanced recycling help us find sustainable sources of previously hard-to-recycle material and support our journey towards zero net waste," said Chris McGrath, vice president and chief of impact, sustainability and well-being at Mondelez. "We also know that designing our packaging for recyclability alone won't solve the problem of plastic waste, which is why we support public-private initiatives to increase recovery and recycling rates across the world."
Mondelez is one of more than 450 companies and organizations to sign the Ellen MacArthur Foundation's New Plastic Economy project. As part of that, the company said that 100 percent of its packaging would be recyclable and labeled with recycling information by 2025.
Mondelez also makes Oreo cookies, belVita and LU biscuits, Cadbury Dairy Milk, Toblerone chocolate, Sour Patch Kids candy and Trident gum.
Berry is based in Evansville, Ind.