In Spain, a consortium of researchers is looking to convert avocado waste into shelf-life-extending food packaging. Dubbed Guacapack Project, the work is being funded by Valencian Innovation Agency and led by ITC Packaging. Aimplas Plastics Technology Centre and Universidad de Alicante’s research group on Polymer and Nanomaterial Analysis are also participating.
“The project is expected to finish at the end of this year, with the production of functional packaging prototypes, prior to the commercialization steps,” Rosa González, the project’s lead researcher at Aimplas, tells PackagingInsights.
The group hopes the packaging will have barrier and antioxidant properties that prevent spoilage of fast-browning foods like guacamole.
“The main challenge is to achieve the required barrier properties to protect the food product, as biodegradable materials do not show the same barrier performance as conventional plastic packaging structures,” González adds. “In this sense, both the incorporation of natural antioxidants from avocado in the packaging material and development of barrier labels based on starch should provide the necessary barrier performance.”