Vitacress is switching to recycled plastic herb pots in an effort to minimise its environmental impact.
From July the herb specialist will start replacing the black plastic pots it currently uses for living herbs with new grey pots made from 90 per cent recycled material.
By the end of September 2018 all of the business’ living herb pots will be grey, allowing more than 176 tonnes of plastic waste to be recycled rather than sent to landfill.
The move follows warnings from environmental charity Wrap that black plastic packaging can’t be sent for recycling by local authorities and that most is ultimately diverted to landfill.
In switching to grey packaging, Vitacress is ensuring that the 20 million living herb pots it packs every year can be recycled.
Vitacress Herbs, which supplies a number of UK supermarkets with living and fresh cut herbs, said its long-term goal was to make all its packaging elements more sustainable by using 100 per cent recyclable or renewable materials.
Managing director Simon Conway said: “Anyone who watched the Blue Planet programme in late 2017 can’t fail to appreciate the damaging impact that single use plastic is having on our planet today.
“Vitacress Herbs is committed to making our world a better place in terms of sustainability and I am proud of the speed at which our team have worked to move away from an unrecyclable black pot to a recyclable one. Our research and development teams are now looking to develop sustainable non-plastic solutions.”
