Paper vs Plastic in Food Packaging #choosecartons

Do you ever consider the type of packaging you food comes in when you purchase it? I never really thought about it until the whole BPA controversy, and then I noticed it even more when I switched to organic eggs. Conventional eggs come in paper cartons while vegetarian fed, free range, organic eggs come in plastic packaging. I still don’t understand why, as I see plastic leading to more pollution and not breaking down, and organic foods are suppose to be moving in a more positive direction. I’ve also noticed that while paper cartons are probably the most eco-friendly solutions when it comes to milk and orange juice, I find myself reaching for the juice in the clear plastic containers as it is more “attractive” and I can see the actual product.

Of course, choosing products really shouldn’t be about how attractive the product packaging is, but rather what the actual product is, right? The type of packaging used also affect how fresh your food stays for a certain amount of time. Whether we go for the plastic or the paper containers, we still recycle as much as we can. Check out some interesting facts about paper cartons:

• Over 41 million households have access to carton recycling, and that number is on the rise. In addition, cartons are made from renewable materials – more than 70 percent of the carton is made from paper, all from trees from responsibly managed forests.
• Packaging plays a very important role in keeping food and beverages fresh. The environmental impact of a package is just as important as the contents inside.
• Cartons are recyclable where facilities exist. The paper fiber contained in cartons is valuable. Recycled cartons are used to make products such as tissue, office paper, wall boards and other building materials. To learn if your community accepts cartons for recycling, please visit www.recyclecartons.com or check with your local recycling program.
• Cartons are made with renewable energy. More than 50 percent of the energy used to make the paper in Evergreen Packaging’s cartons comes from biomass.
• Responsible forestry promotes new forest growth, and these forests help to diminish greenhouse gases. Forests remove carbon from the atmosphere and store it in trees. In the US, due to both increases in the total area of forest land and increases in the carbon stored per acre, an additional 192 million metric tons of carbon are sequestered each year through responsible forest management programs nationwide. This offsets roughly 11% of the country’s industrial greenhouse gas emissions, the equivalent of removing almost 135 million passenger vehicles from the nation’s highways.

After reading these fun facts and learning more about paper vs plastic, I have made a conscious effort to choose foods that are packaged in paper cartons- although I still cannot find organic eggs in paper cartons! For more information about paper vs plastic, check out Evergreen. Educate your friends: every carton fact shared, via Twitter, using the hashtag #choosecartons will help raise money for Habitat for Humanity®

You can also connect with Evergreen on Facebook and Twitter to find out more about their initiatives.

I wrote this review while participating in a campaign by Mom Central Consulting on behalf of Evergreen and received a promotional item to thank me for taking the time to participate.