Aldi awarded for excellence in reducing plastic and packaging waste
Aldi Ireland has been awarded the title of Plastic Pledge Gold Winner at the 2021 Pakman Awards
Print2 November 2021
Aldi Ireland has been awarded the title of Plastic Pledge Gold Winner at the 2021 Pakman Awards, in recognition of its work in reducing plastic and packaging waste in their products and stores.
Hosted at the Shelbourne Hotel, the judges at Repak’s 2021 Pakman Awards praised Aldi for its efforts in recycling and supporting the circular economy by reducing and limiting plastic in their product packaging. Two other companies won the Gold Winner award during the event ‐ Coca Cola and Lidl Ireland.
The Pakman Awards are the national environmental awards that recognise recycling and waste management among businesses, organisations, community groups and individuals in Ireland.
Aldi has set ambitious targets to reduce and remove the amount of plastic used across its business. These include:
- 100% of its own-label packaging to be reusable, recyclable or compostable by 2022 (and branded products by 2025).
- Reduce plastic packaging by 50% by 2025.
- Reduce all packaging by 50% by 2025.
- 50% of its plastic packaging to be made of recycled content by 2025.
- Eliminate problematic plastic packaging from core food ranges by 2020.
- 100% pulp-based packaging across Core range must be FSC or PEFC certified or made of minimum 70% recycled content by 2020.
The programme has also seen Aldi become the first Irish supermarket to:
- Fully remove over 4.5 million single-use plastic straws from its own-brand products, replacing them with recyclable paper straws.
- Introduce home compostable trays to its Specially Selected steak range.
- Introduce 100% recyclable wax paper packaging across its own-brand White Family Pan and Wholemeal Sliced Pan.
- Fully remove all black plastic from core food ranges.
- Introduce 100% recycled PET water bottles to its own-label water ranges, a change which affects more than 30 million water bottles each year.
- Trialling 100% home compostable bags across its 1kg Irish Rooster Potato range.
- Other initiatives include moving to recyclable material across yogurt pots, pizza ranges, falafel, and veggie burger ranges, and introducing home compostable and recyclable material across potted herbs.
- Introduce new fully biodegradable teabags made from plant-based materials across all our own-label ranges.
Since committing to its plastic-reduction targets, Aldi has removed more than 2,150 tonnes of virgin plastic from its 148 Irish stores and replaced over 930 tonnes of unrecyclable material with recyclable alternatives.
Welcoming the win, Niall O’Connor, Aldi Group managing director, said: “We are dedicated to reducing, reusing and recycling all packaging as well as making shopping sustainably as easy as possible for all our customers. Winning the Plastic Pledge Gold Winner Award recognises the great work our staff, suppliers and packaging partners have undertaken to reduce and remove plastic from our supply chain. We understand customers are constantly looking for more sustainable ways to shop with us, and we are committed to our plastic pledges and minimising the amount of plastic and packaging used in our stores.”
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