According to data from the European Commission[1], the 2011-2020 decade was the warmest ever recorded, with the global average temperature in 2019 being 1.1 °C higher than pre-industrial levels.

The main driver of climate change is excessive emissions of greenhouse gases (mainly CO2). Some gases in the Earth's atmosphere act much like the glass in a greenhouse: they retain the sun's heat and prevent it from escaping into space, thus causing global warming. The carbon footprint is used to represent the total volume of greenhouse gases (GHG).

Committed to sustainability, Giró collaborated with ITENE to carry out a comparative analysis of the carbon footprint of different fruit and vegetable packaging solutions, in order to find out which of them have a lower impact on the environment and climate change.

The results show that the carbon footprint is closely related to the weight of the containers, suggesting that, in general, the greater the weight, the greater the carbon footprint:

Typically, packaging solutions that do not contain plastic tend to weigh more than the same products in plastic. This is because plastic is a very lightweight material, which is highly resource-optimized compared to other materials. In addition, plastic tends to have an easier economic transformation and greater logistical savings.

At Giró we believe that there is no single, perfect solution for everyone, but that the key lies in offering the material that best suits each situation and market. As experts in fruit and vegetable packaging, we have always defended that it is best to analyze each case in order to offer the best solution to our customers.

Sources[1]:

European Commission - Climate Action Department: Causes of Climate Change

https://climate.ec.europa.eu/climate-change/causes-climate-change_en