Packaging company Amcor (Hawthorn / Australia; www.amcor.com) has developed a PET bottle for pasteurised beer in Brazil. The custom 600 ml containers were made for drinks company New Age Bebidas (São Paulo / Brazil; www.newagebebidas.com.br) and introduced at the Fispal Tecnologia (www.fispaltecnologia.com.br) trade fair in June 2019. Amcor said it has undertaken a pre-market trial in select cities in São Paulo state. “As the craft beer market grows, we are partnering with brewers to achieve attractive designs and cost savings with PET bottles, while also meeting shelf-life requirements,” said Felipe Salles, business development director for Amcor in Brazil.

The fully recyclable PET bottle, which showcases New Age’s “Salzburg” brand, features a crown metal cap and incorporates an oxygen scavenger barrier that provides up to four months of shelf life. Amcor said the bottle’s light weight also significantly reduces transportation costs as well as energy and CO₂ emissions along the supply chain.

In separate news, the Australian packaging group has become one of the founding members of a Chinese e-commerce alliance. The China Ecommerce & Logistics Packaging Standard Alliance was initiated by leading Chinese online retailer JD.com (Beijing; www.jd.com) and brings together six other well-known brands – Heinz (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania / USA; www.heinz.com), Procter & Gamble (P&G, Cincinnati, Ohio / USA; www.pg.com), Johnson & Johnson (New Brunswick, New Jersey / USA; www.jnj.com), Chinese dairy giant Mengniu (Hohhot, Inner Mongolia; www.mengniuir.com), Unilever (London / UK; www.unilever.com) and China Packaging Research and Test Centre (CPRTC, Binhai, Tianjin; www.packagetest.net).

Amcor said its participation builds on more than a year of strategic collaboration with JD.com. “The initiative proves that in China, players across the value chain start taking actions to overcome some of the challenges of a booming ecommerce channel, through better, more environmentally friendly and faster-to-market packaging, similar to what we have seen in the rest of the world,” said Virginie Maes, vice president of e-commerce and business development at Amcor, which is the only packaging company among the alliance.

The initiative aims to create, validate and deploy e-commerce-ready product packaging standards in China. The country is the largest e-commerce market in the world and was worth USD 1,300bn (EUR 1,184 bn) in 2018. It is expected to continue growing at an annual rate of 18%.