The Centre has used their recent grant of $9,500 to provide bins for food waste, compostable packaging and recyclables at the market since the beginning of July.

The Centre’s Plastic Free Kaitāia Co-ordinator Waikarere Gregory says they began the project to coincide with Plastic Free July and collected two 60l bags of compostable material at one market alone, despite the poor weather. Previously only a general rubbish bin was available.

“It’s been a great success, reducing waste in the council landfill bins by up to 75% each week,” she says.

The compostable material collected from the market goes towards creating compost by KaitāiaCycle a collaboration with Good Life Projects (which works with youth and adults with intellectual disabilities to create bountiful gardens), CBEC Ecosolutions and Earthcare, Waikarere says.

The Centre identified the need for bins after running a trial at the market and found a strong zero-waste contingent, with most stalls using compostable or recyclable packaging. The trial also found many members of the public were keen to reduce waste to landfill, but a lack of bins meant compostable or recyclable material was going in general rubbish bins, she says.

“We’re also going to work with stallholders to help them move toward better packaging options that can be either recycled or composted, and ideally work towards a reusable system.”

The Centre took a zero-waste approach to the entire operation with the reusable bin liners sewn by local group Anō Anō Clothing Rescue, from old shower curtains, flags and material, Waikarere says.

She also uses an e-bike and trailer, on some days, to transport some of their gear to and from the market.

“We are currently looking for someone to employ to oversee the bins, but in the meantime are managing a roster system with our current contractors,” she says.

The Packaging Forum CEO Rob Langford says the Forum also supplied the Centre with a bin stand and signage from the Litter Less Recycling More project it was involved with to help make the bins more visible and prevent them toppling in high winds.

“We thought this was a great project because it not only keeps recyclable and compostable material out of landfill but helps with educating the public around putting waste in the right bins and not just choosing landfill as the default option,” he says.

Sustainability is about meeting the needs of today, without adversely impacting on the needs of tomorrow. Sustainability in manufacturing is achieved with new or improved technologies alongside sustainable business philosophies and models.

Achieving greater sustainability is also not just about production efficiencies, minimising waste and maximising resources. A well-run digital manufacturing floor helps manufacturers become more sustainable by enabling faster access to better quality information for informed decision making.

Aspect Productivity Technology, a member of The Packaging Forum, explains how their Manufacturing Execution System (MES) is doing just that, and helping its packaging customers become more sustainable.

 Bonson Packaging’s sustainability philosophy

Sustainability is an important goal at Bonson Packaging in Auckland. They support a circular economy with an offering of recyclable, bio-degradable and compostable products.

The company promotes a reduce, reuse, recycle and recover philosophy and applies these practices to its operations.

An example of this is Bonson using data from the AspectPL MES software to monitor the power usage of their machines. Machine output might be the same, but power usage can fluctuate. Data from AspectPL helps Bonson reduce electricity costs and its carbon footprint.

According to Bonson, the data supplied by AspectPL has helped reduce machine power use by 5% – giving their products a smaller carbon footprint.

Proficiency allows time for efficiency, reducing downtime and waste

Cormack Packaging has saved so many man hours since it implemented an MES, it now has time to concentrate on optimising production.

“Previously our planning information wasn’t totally accurate. We’d count boxes off the machine. The machine makes the product, we pack boxes, we count the number of boxes made.

“With AspectPL we have full visibility and real-time reporting on what’s actually happening. You can easily move jobs from machine to machine and look at ‘what if’ scenarios. The AspectPL scheduler has also saved us two days per month planning 250 work orders,” says Production Manager Shaun Wallace.

“Now I can work with the guys on the factory floor to optimize production. Currently we are working on making our changeovers faster, improving our line start and line clearance downtimes, and reducing waste. With AspectPL we can see these stats at the push of a button – and in real time.’’

Monitoring and measuring manufacturing processes not only reduces waste and improves productivity. It also helps businesses pursue sustainability through better quality information that supports long-term business viability.

Aspect Productivity Technology Ltd

Aspect Productivity Technology Ltd is an Auckland-based SaaS software company. Its product AspectPL is an MES (Manufacturing Execution System) specifically designed for plastics and packaging manufacturers.

AspectPL customers gain the practical benefits of having digital data available on their manufacturing floor. They also use the data analysis and insights to achieve their sustainability philosophies.