联合早报 | 起步公司将可持续包装与食物垃圾回收再循环
联合早报 | 起步公司将可持续包装与食物垃圾回收再循环
本地起步公司与肯德基合作展开试行计划，采用以植物为原材料的食物包装，并将这种可持续的包装与食物垃圾一起回收再循环，减少污染。食品包装起步公司TRIA本月起和肯德基展开为期六个月的试行计划，为位于纳福城（Northpoint City）的肯德基快餐店提供可持续包装，并回收使用过的包装和食物垃圾进行再循环。
ST | S'pore firm TRIA partners KFC
The Straits Times | S’pore firm TRIA partners KFC
Source: The Straits Times – Luke Pachymuthu, Senior Correspondent
Mr Ng told The Straits Times on the sidelines of the official launch event in Tuas that the six-month pilot would also involve close collaboration with Norwegian fertiliser giant Yara International to help it assess the commercial viability of scaling the pilot to make a product that is compliant with international global standards. “With Yara, we will look at how we can further improve and enhance the product such that this becomes commercial grade fertiliser, making this a full loop right from cradle to the farm,” said Mr Ng, adding that the urgency to find sustainable alternative sources of fertilisers was now more pronounced following the Russia-Ukraine conflict.
Western sanctions on Russia, a major exporter of fertilisers, have disrupted shipments of these natural resources globally, forcing farmers worldwide to scale back usage and reduce the amount of land they use for growing essential crops such as wheat, corn and rice. “The TRIA-KFC organic recycling pilot is an important example of projects which can help smallholder (farmers who work on plots that average 1.2ha) and commercial farmers and governments achieve food security, while ensuring sustainability in Singapore and other nations around the world,” said Ms Marisa Soares, vice-president – Farming Solutions, Africa and Asia at Yara International. She added that scaling such projects would require more partners within the food chain getting more aggressive in adopting sustainable solutions, similar to KFC Singapore. “This will require investment from all concerned, but we aim to prove that closing the loop in this ecosystem can be financially sustainable, while having a positive impact on our natural resources,” she said.
“Should we be successful in this project, we will leverage our regional and global presence to create a marketplace for this solution, leveraging our connectivity and presence on the farm to support farmers and to help them adopt and use new solutions that would have a positive impact – not only on the soil, but also on crops and on helping to reduce carbon emissions.”
Mr Ng said TRIA will work alongside Singapore-listed recycling and environmental services company Shanaya to collect the waste bags from the KFC outlet, which will then be transported to the waste processing facility currently located at the premises of Shanaya’s waste management plant in Tuas. By recycling food waste that would otherwise have to be incinerated, the collaboration with KFC helps to drive greater sustainability in the food services industry and support the Singapore Green Plan 2030, Mr Ng said. “Such ownership is imperative in driving circular food systems because we know that circularity cannot be done in isolation,” said Mr Ng, while encouraging potential partners interested in shaping the future of circular food systems to come forward and team up with it.
KFC Singapore’s general manager Lynette Lee said it will review the results and assess the viability of scaling the programme across all its restaurants in Singapore at the end of the pilot. “Through this partnership, KFC Singapore aims to continue our efforts for the environment and take the lead to bring together zero waste close-loop recycling concept in the food and beverage industry,” said Ms Lee.
Minister of State for Trade and Industry Low Yen Ling, the guest of honour at the event, emphasised the importance of innovation in Singapore accomplishing its zero waste goals. “Clever circular economy solutions like what we see today have the potential to break the cycle of escalating waste. Innovation is critical for sustainable development, especially with rising global demand for food supplies and fast-depleting resources,” she said.The collaboration was facilitated by Enterprise Singapore under the Enterprise Sustainability Programme launched in 2021 that supports Singapore companies to build capabilities and capture new opportunities in the green economy.
Photos: TRIA, Lianhe Zaobao, The Straits Times
Click here to read the full article.
Sustainability in Packaging Asia Conference
TRIA was invited to speak at the recent Sustainability in Packaging Asia 2022 Conference, sharing the stage with our partner, fast-food giant KFC, represented by Lynette Lee, General Manager of KFC Singapore.
We shared about the upcoming pilot between KFC and TRIA to close the loop for single-use packaging. This pilot positions Singapore as a front runner in closing the loop for single-use packaging, and demonstrating that circularity can be achieved for the Quick Service Restaurant (QSR) sector. Watch this space for our upcoming launch next week and looking forward to share more details.
Launch of Design-for-Recycling (DFR) Programme
TRIA launches the Design-for-Recycling (DFR) programme to close the loop for fashion retailers!
In Singapore today, only 4% of clothing gets recycled, with low recycling rates too for accompanying packaging. We start with a one-time house-keeping to streamline the brand’s packaging to reduce redundancies accumulated over the years, let’s put a stop to over packaging for e-commerce purchases! This exercise also includes the development of a collect back system to collect the packaging and old clothing for recycling. To fashion retailers out there, let recycling work for you! We can help you create more engagement between your brand and consumers.
Shanaya partners TRIA in organic recycling
TRIA and Shanaya, an SGX listed recycling and environmental services company joins hands to tackle the recycling of foodservice waste with organic recycling.
Under this agreement, TRIA will provide the digestion technologies including installing an aerobic digester at Shanaya Environmental’s premises. Shanaya Environmental will provide collection services for the food waste and biodegradable packaging waste, and operate the digester under the agreement where TRIA will take back the organic fertilizer for further valorisation processing.
The success of this agreement will be a precursor towards a long-term exclusive partnership between TRIA and Shanaya Environmental in organic waste recycling in Singapore.
Announcement on Shanaya SGX https://www.shareinvestor.com/news/news.html?source=sg_sgxnet&nid=515484290
Edwin Seah, sustainability leader, joins TRIA's Board of Advisors
TRIA is honored to welcome Edwin Seah to our Board of Advisors. With his experience across the region in sustainability, packaging, policy and strategic communications, Edwin’s knowledge and insights will help to propel TRIA’s growth.
“I’m pleased to share that I’m joining the Board of Advisors at Singapore-based packaging, design & solutions company TRIA Pte. Ltd. It’s an immense honour, coming at an important and challenging time for the packaging and food industries, and our environment.
TRIA has made great strides since they were founded in 2016. I’ve been impressed with the vision, ideas and more importantly, the packaging circularity solutions that the team led by CEO Pei Kang Ng have introduced.
Beyond just producing sustainable packaging for food, they’ve now developed a complete circular solution to address the problem of single use plastics, packaging waste, and marine litter.
It comes in the form of plant-based bottles developed by TRIA that can be digested in 24hrs (TRIA also developed the technology behind this) and converted to crop-grade fertiliser! A truly pioneering circular process that ditches plastics and gives end-of-life waste a new lease of life.
Lots of countries & brands are still struggling with solutions to plastic & packaging waste. Mechanical recycling and rPET isn’t really going to bring the significant change needed because you’d require the concurrent presence of source segregation, high collection rates and costly recycling infrastructure to yield the high quantities of high quality PCR needed to move the needle.
And let’s not forget that rPET isn’t free of plastics because many countries cap the percentage of recycled plastics in every bottle. Which means it still needs to be infused with new plastics. It’s the same with every time the rPET is recycled – new plastics needs to be blended in to prop up the quality of the rPET. Are we actually reducing plastics use and waste, or dialling up on it?
If we are serious about tackling the problem, we need to look at real plastic-free solutions. I’d venture to say plant-base packaging paired with organic recycling is a solution that needs to be adopted and now.”
Eco-Business A-list for Sustainability Leadership
We very proud to share that our CEO Ng Pei Kang made it to the Eco-Business A-list 2020 for Sustainability Leadership. This is a a privilege indeed to be awarded alongside recipients such as David Yeung of Green Monday, Mikkel Larsen of DBS and Dave Ingram of Unilever. This year’s A-list was selected out of almost 100 nominations from countries and territories including Australia, India, Singapore, Hong Kong, Malaysia and Myanmar.
Thanks to the team at Eco-Business for giving us a voice to drive circularity.
Find out more about the recipients of the 2020 A-List here https://lnkd.in/e4BVgzc
Circularity: Desert or Opportunity?
Read about our CEO’s sharing on how circularity is “tough business”, why the industry is not attracting top talent, and why he has no regrets in embarking on this path.
“Sustainability is in a difficult space where you have to make sure [your product or service] is scalable. Sustainability and scalability have an inverse relationship. There have been a lot of sustainability, corporate social responsibility movements, but they are only one-time events because there is no scalable business model.
There are people who want to fund and promote sustainability activities, but there is a big gulf between sustainability and scalability. It really requires commitment to invest in scalability to realise circularity.”
Ng Pei Kang, CEO TRIA
Read more on Eco-business at the link here! Signing up is free.
Pre-A Investments by Glocalink
We are very pleased to announce the investments from Glocalink as part of our Pre-A Series Funding.
Glocalink is an early stage deep tech investment firm with a focus on supporting the Agrifood sector in Southeast Asia region. It is backed by Japanese entrepreneurs with diverse background in biotech (Japanese Bio firm, Euglena), agricultural machinery (Kobashi industries), education, food & technology (Leave a Nest group). (Glocalink website)
“Innovation can’t germinate in isolation. We empower dynamic founders with strategic capital & networks of leading corporations, investors & technologists to build enduring enterprises & partnerships.”
Dr. Yukihiro Maru, co-founder Glocalink
Glocalink has an extensive network in Japan and opens TRIA to strategic partnerships with Japanese Corporations and market. With this synergy, we hope to accelerate the pace of closing the loop with TRIA Bio24.
In photo, (right) Dr. Kihoko Tokue, Managing Director Leave a Nest Singapore Pte. Ltd.; (left) Mr. Ng Pei Kang, CEO TRIA Pte. Ltd.
Grand winner! ASEAN-Korea Excellent Design Award
As part of the plan to expand on ASEAN-Korea cooperation in the design industry, the ASEAN-Korea Centre (AKC), Korea Institute for Design Promotion (KIDP) and VIETRADE organized the 1st ASEAN-Korea Excellent Design Exhibition Award. Among entries from the nine ASEAN nations, TRIA took one for Singapore by winning the grand prize! This will be a second award for 4Finger’s new range of packaging. Read more about the design here.
