Using benzene-free ink to ensure the safety of food soft packaging

I think that domestic food users may have higher requirements for packaging. Food packaging and printing are mostly two or three colors in foreign countries. The printing process is relatively simple, while the domestic market is quite complicated. With oil-coated ice sealant, there are always eight or nine colors. If you look closely, you will find that complex patterns such as portraits are often an important factor in attracting consumers. The exquisite degree of packaging has occupied an important role in product sales.

As a food company, we are most concerned about food safety and food tastes. During the processing of flexible packaging, such as the additives used in blown film processing, and the selection of adhesives used in composite processing, care must be taken to avoid food health hazards; since chocolate is a food that is easy to absorb, if the flexible packaging Material has an odor, it is likely to cause chocolate taste, affect product quality. 〉〉True and fake identification - Thousands of product identification methods

The choice of ink is also critical. Non-benzene ink generally refers to the use of polyurethane as the main resin ink, basically does not contain benzene solvents, even to achieve a certain printing effect, the use of a small amount of benzene solvent, the ink after drying the benzene solvent residue is also very small. Therefore, benzene-free ink has gradually been welcomed by food companies. Ai Fen vigorously promotes the use of benzene-free inks. At present, our food products include Baolu Dog Food and Weijia Cat Food, all of which use benzene-free inks and are very popular with consumers.

However, some of the infant formula soft packs are still using benzene-containing inks, which is a very scary thing. At present, the packaging and printing of milk powder is mainly based on plastic composite flexible packaging, and metal cans are also used. Plastic composite flexible packaging printing is basically printed on plastic film, then compounded with aluminized film or aluminum foil and hot filler material. For general milk powder packaging, chlorinated polypropylene resin inks are mainly used for printing. Although ink manufacturers have adopted a variety of methods to reduce the residual of benzene-based toxic solvents in the packaging, there is still a small amount of residue.

In order to completely eliminate toxic solvent residues, milk powder packaging must be printed with benzene-free ink, but benzene-free inks have some problems in the printing process, resulting in defects of low printing quality, and failing in terms of composite strength and heat sealing performance. To requirements, and the price is relatively high, so the actual application will take a long period of time, to be further mature technology.

At present, some ink manufacturers are also researching and developing more environmentally friendly water-based plastic printing inks and have entered the trial printing stage. Once the technology is mature, benzene-free inks will replace benzene-containing inks to provide food users with safer and more reliable food packaging. . In the future, benzene-free ink will become the mainstream choice for food flexible packaging and printing inks.

Interviewee: Aifen Food (Beijing) Co., Ltd.

Solvent-free compound competition, achievement of soft packaging environmental protection dream

The flexible printing possesses the characteristics of exquisite printing, attracting customers, promoting sales, vacuuming, retort sterilization, and long shelf life, providing a strong guarantee for the sound development of our vegetable and food production companies. The development of flexible packaging complements the development of the food industry.

In recent years, with the strengthening of product quality and environmental protection awareness in China, green packaging materials and processes are increasingly favored by composite film packaging and flexible packaging end-users.

The solvent-free composite process is an advanced green composite process. It does not have the problem of exhaust emissions, it does not require large and complex heating blasts, exhaust air exhaust devices, equipment is simple, energy consumption is reduced, the process flow is simple, the equipment footprint is small. It is appropriate to reduce costs, save resources, and protect the environment. Therefore, I think that the solvent-free composite process will be the direction of the development of composite technologies in the future, and it is also the general trend of food packaging in the future.

The use of solvent-free adhesives in China is relatively late, and the development of compatible solvent-free adhesives is also lagging behind. Although many solventless laminators have been in operation at present, most middle and low-grade plastic flexible packaging materials can also be produced with solvent-free adhesives. However, due to factors such as composite quality, most of the current food flexible packaging is still widely used. Solvent adhesives and solvent adhesives are still the mainstream products on the market.

China's solvent-free two-component polyurethane adhesives are far from universal. The main reasons are that solvent-free composite equipment is expensive on the one hand, and it has higher requirements on operators. On the other hand, compound-quality problems are more likely to occur when solvent-free products are compounded, and these factors restrict its popularization and use. From a long-term perspective, with the increasingly stringent environmental protection laws and the continuous development of the economy, the proportion of solvent-free and alcohol-soluble products will continue to rise.

Research and development of environmentally friendly production processes, in line with safety, health, environmental protection and resource-saving food packaging development direction, is the entire food packaging industry should strive for the goal.

Interviewee: Jidong Huanghua Group Co., Ltd.

Cost worry, cold drinks and soft packaging make it difficult

Domestic and foreign consumers have very different ideas about cold drinks. In foreign countries, especially in Europe, people regard cold drinks as a dessert-like food, and in China, more people regard cold drinks as a thirst-quenching drink. Single cold drinks are the most common form. Therefore, there is a great demand for plastic soft packs that are suitable for single cold drinks.

We are a professional cold drink company with an absolute majority of flexible packaging. Due to the particularity of cold drinks, such as low temperature and low storage environment, the requirements on the barrier properties of packaging materials are not very high, and more requirements for packaging are the novel appearance of packaging and the hygienic safety of packaging materials.

The health and safety of food soft packaging is the most important. Especially in soft plastic packaging. Unilever stipulates that benzene-free ink must be used for all product packaging materials that are in direct contact with food. Our products exported to foreign countries all use cold sealant technology. Cold sealant is coated with a layer of film at the sealing area. Sealing is not required without high temperature (cold drink, chocolate is not resistant to high temperature), and cold seal is more beautiful.

Cold packaging packaging design is also very important. The design of flexible packaging is generally for experienced advertising companies. Obviously, the design of flexible packaging has a significant impact on its market sales, and people often buy products because they recognize the exquisite packaging. So our investment in this one is big.

The use of benzene-free inks will increase the cost, so many companies are still using benzene-containing inks. At present, in some small and medium-sized cities in China, many sources of flexible packaging are not regular, and there are many products that cannot achieve the safety of food packaging.

Due to the high cost of cold sealant, it is still not widely used in China. Some domestic chocolate manufacturers have begun to use cold sealant technology, such as Dove chocolate. Since the profit margin of cold drinks is far lower than that of chocolate, it is currently impossible to promote this technology in the domestic market.

In addition, water-based glue is an environmentally friendly product, but because it is not resistant to high temperatures (which can cause high-temperature delamination), it does not meet the requirements of packaging products. For example, we tried to make a cover film, and we can only do light packaging. In addition, the water-based glue has relatively high requirements for equipment, and the practical application is not very good.

In the design of cold drink packaging, there are often similar packages that come with our new packaging. In fact, domestic packaging suppliers do not do a good job of keeping customers secret. Moreover, due to the rapid updating of soft drinks in cold drinks, and the technical content is often insufficient to meet the requirements for patent applications, it is still difficult to protect the intellectual property of their own packaging, which needs to be further explored by the relevant departments.

Many good soft packages are too expensive to be marketed. For example, Cadbury's mid-visible transparent and aluminum-plated packaging on the side is very beautiful, but its process is complicated and the cost is too high. In addition, the added value of cold drinks and transportation and storage costs can only be used to control costs. Sigh.