Highlights
- The vast majority of Asian food items imported from overseas come already packaged in small quantities, exposing independent grocery store operators to problems of plastic waste
- Smaller traders say they have no influence over the way imported foods are packaged and have received little demand from customers to reduce plastic waste
- A Melbourne couple is tackling plastic packaging waste by allowing customers to shop for Asian produce plastic-free
Plastic is king in Asian grocery stores around Australia.
On the surface, you’d have no way of knowing that inside a tin of Chinese egg roll biscuits, each pair of the flaky snack is meticulously wrapped in multiple layers of packaging.
East and Southeast Asia’s obsession with hygiene and convenience, combined with people’s pride in gifting, dictates that much of what is found on supermarket shelves is overwrapped.
Flaky egg roll biscuits in multiple layers of packaging (left), carefully placed in another tin. Source: Tania Lee
In Asian grocery stores across Australia, it is common to find fresh and preserved vegetables, frozen dumplings as well as dried noodles all protected in single-use plastic.
The vast amount of packaging left from preparing a meal using these types of ingredients drove electronics engineer Brian Ooi and marketing professional Jian Loh to launch Australia’s “first” Asian grocery store for people to shop plastic-free.
Baby steps in promoting sustainable living
Stocking and selling Asian staples at Brian Ooi’s and Jian Loh’s store, Naked Asian Grocer – as they’ve named their online store - works a little differently.
The aim is to lessen the store’s environmental impact while running a profitable venture, as well as persuading those who are transitioning to a more sustainable lifestyle to stick to their new habits.
“From our pricing perspective, I think we try to make it as affordable as possible. Our intention is for people to come into this kind of lifestyle and stay with it,” said Ms Loh, who came to Australia from Penang, Malaysia in 2008 with her now-husband Brian.
Such ideas come with challenges, including finding suppliers who will accommodate their requests like single rather than double bagging and sending food in bigger bulks.
Brian Ooi sorting through bulk bags of dried noodles. Source: Tania Lee
“We blatantly tell customers we are not plastic-free 100 per cent but we are working towards it. There is still work in our supply chain that we need to address,” said Ms Loh.
The couple operates their store from their garage in the evenings after clocking off from their day jobs.
They say a majority of suppliers push back after contemplating the extra work required to cater to the needs of their “tiny” business.
“When you have one or two that are willing to do it for you, it actually does get a little bit easier because we sort of show them that it's actually not difficult to do,” said Mr Ooi.
After launching the store in February, the couple says they are “ticking all the right boxes” and are progressing towards their dreams of working full-time to scale their business to form a physical presence across major Australian capital cities.
Plastic-free Asian staples. Source: Naked Asian Grocer
They envisage that one day their physical store will allow customers to buy fresh produce, top-up their soy sauce bottles and rice jars while scooping frozen food and biscuits into their own containers.
“Definitely when we have a retail store, that unlocks a lot of options for us,” said Ms Loh.
Big retailers and manufacturers have packaging targets, smaller players play catch-up
State-based measures and voluntary federal government schemes have been pushing the industry to reduce plastic waste.
One of the latest pacts, the National Packaging Targets, include having 100 per cent of packaging reusable, recyclable and or compostable by 2025.
Additionally, 70 per cent of plastic needs to be recycled or composted and single-use plastic will be phased out.
Currently, 89 per cent of plastic is technically recyclable even though it’s not all recycled, while 11 per cent is currently not recyclable or unknown.
Led by The Australian Packaging Covenant Organisation (APCO), the targets apply to all packaging that is made, used and sold in Australia.
Although almost all plastic is recyclable, a vast majority isn't in Australia. Source: AAP
After signing-up major supermarket chains and multinational brands such as Woolworths, Coles, Coca Cola Amatil and Nestle, APCO’s CEO Brooke Donnelly says the organisation is now shifting to attract small and medium-sized enterprises, including Australian suppliers of overseas manufactured goods, and train them on .
“The worst thing to do here is to make people feel like they’re not empowered to change and create a positive environmental outcome,” says Ms Donnelly.
“The transition will be difficult, but it’s not an impossible transition and there are resources and tools available to assist those organisations in making those changes,” she adds in reference to Australian importers of specialist products from countries that do not have mature, sustainable approach to packaging.
But Peter*, a Melbourne importer and wholesaler of Asian goods, who did not want to be named, told SBS Chinese they were not aware of any Commonwealth or state-based plastic plan, nor had he received feedback from customers demanding changes to existing packaging.
Asked if they would sign up to such a pact, they said, “it all comes down to economics ... I have to see if the savings outweigh the original outlay. If the government wants us to change, it has to be economically viable”.
“Once the government comes up with the technical information [on packaging materials requirements] then I think manufacturers overseas will have to adhere to it otherwise we won't be able to import.”
Vincent Rouillard, head of the Sustainable Packaging Solutions research project at Victoria University in Melbourne, says the 2025 National Packaging Targets are very ambitious.
Australia's environment ministers have agreed to phase out a raft of single-use plastics by 2025. Source: AP
“Practical government support for the packaging industry is needed to needed to achieve them,” he says.
WWF Australia’s plastics policy manager Kate Nobel says there is a clear trend globally towards removing non-recyclable plastic packaging from the market not just here, but internationally.
For example, China is currently implementing an extensive range of new policies to ban various plastic bag formats, plastic film applications, and numerous other single-use plastic products.
“In the long term, that’s going to affect what’s imported into Australia,” says Ms Nobel.
WWF is calling for the targets to be made mandatory because of concerns around the detrimental impacts plastics have on the environment.
“We’re not convinced those targets will be achieved if they’re voluntary.”
“It’s a matter of government coming up with a plan for a start and also giving us information on what kind of packaging is environmentally-friendly so that we can relay that to our suppliers,” says Peter.
‘Powerless’ at the bottom of the supply chain
The vast majority of food items that Chris Lam sells, at his family-run Asian grocery store Dong Nam A in Sydney’s Chinatown, comes from overseas already packaged in small quantities.
He says he feels he has very little control over the way foods are packaged.
Asian grocery store owner Chris Lam. Source: Ranky Law
“As a trader, we wouldn’t avoid a particular product or particular supplier because of their use of packaging. We’re definitely very low on the chain,” says Mr Lam.
But David Stout, Director of Policy at the National Retailers Association, doesn’t agree.
“They feel like they’re powerless. They do [have influence]. They can stop buying,” Mr Stout says, adding the plastic plan is primarily targeted at manufacturers.
“The influence needs to go up through the supply chain. The manufacturer is the best person to really appreciate exactly what packaging is required.”
Mr Lam believes the onus is on the manufacturer and the government, while the feedback needs to come from the consumer.
He adds a vast majority of his clients are Asian who haven’t caught on to the plastic-free movement and are, in fact, doing the opposite.
“There’s a small minority that asks for more bags than they need. That’s something we don’t accommodate,” he says.
Asian snacks covered in multiple layers of plastic packaging. Source: Ranky Law
But he says younger customers at the store are starting to bring their own reusable produce bags and second-generation store owners such as him are trying to be mindful of packaging waste, at least for their online store, Seasia Foods, an offshoot of their parent’s Chinatown store - one of the area’s oldest.
The need to rethink plastic use and overpackaging
Dr Rouillard says as consumers start to allow packaging to influence their decisions, their product selection could be based on thoughtful packaging.
He says the government needs to help set up facilities and expertise locally to assist retailers to cope with this change in attitude as small traders like Mr Lam will have no means of influencing the manufacture and packaging of the products they import.
“They’ll be stuck and their clients will walk away from them, which means they need to shop around for a supplier, not only of the product but the supplier that produces the product that is properly packaged,” says Dr Rouillard.
“Packaging on the one end is a great lifesaver. It preserves food, if you live in Africa, you can eat fresh fruit, fresh vegetables, extend your life, it's a marvellous thing. There’s also less food waste,” he says. 
But, at the moment, it’s cheaper to make “virgin” or new plastic from petrochemicals than recycle old plastic.
Fishermen clean their net from the plastic garbage washed ashore at Banda Aceh, Indonesia. Source: AAP
The UN Environment Programme reports that of plastic in the world is ever recycled, 12 per cent is incinerated.
Victoria University is currently lobbying the government to get funding to set up a packaging innovation hub to develop new and more sustainable packaging materials in Australia.
Dr Rouillard’s team has already started developing packaging out of seaweed and is currently working on new material made of pea starch by partnering with a company that produces a huge amount of waste products from the vegetable.
He says the world has no choice but to develop packaging that’s cheap, readily available and environmentally sustainable, otherwise “we’ll be swimming in that stuff [microplastics]” that ends up in waterways, in marine life and back into the food chain.
“Bad packaging has a sting in the tail, we need to wean ourselves from bad, difficult to recycle packaging to packaging that can easily be recycled and composted,” he said.
*Peter preferred not to disclose his real name.
