We see all sorts of market numbers passed around, which soon become holy gospel recited by everyone from those that just have a passing interest in the potential of nanotechnologies to those who are actually developing business plans around these numbers.
The market numbers floating around are so numerous, and often so egregiously misleading, that we really don’t know where to begin.
So, we thought we would make the rational choice and…pick one out of hat (as it seems this is where most of these numbers come from anyway).
This one we found in the ETC Group’s “Down on the Farm” report. In the report, which is intended to reveal to us the hidden horrors of nanotechnologies in the food industry, a reference is made to a report on “Active, Controlled, and Smart” packaging that says “smart packaging” is a $38 billion a year market today.
Wow…really?! Could it be true we wondered. Our interest may not have been to combat the growing threat of nanotechnology in our lives, but to find out where we could buy some of this cool new packaging.
So we looked at the report, it turns out the report comes from the BCC Research Report on “RP-182 Active, Controlled and Intelligent Packaging for Foods and Beverages.”
From the title alone, we were already getting a little suspicious that maybe we weren’t going to see our Oreo cookies package tell us if some terrorist had contaminated it with poison, or that it just wasn’t as fresh as it could be.
Sure enough, BCC clearly explained what they meant by the terms “Active” “Controlled” and “Intelligent”.
“Active” packaging was all about “oxygen scavengers, moisture controllers and a more active role for ethylene absorbers to help reduce the pathogens and gasses that contribute to food spoilage.” These products contributed to $2.4 billion of the total $5.9 billion dollar active packaging market, the rest being edible films and coatings.
“Controlled” includes aseptic and retort packages, MAP/CAP, sous vide and biodegradable packaging, reached annual sales. This market contribute over $13 billion to the $38 billion figure.
But when were we going to get to the smart packaging, you know with the little voice from the package that says, You have one week to consume these potato chips.
Ah, but at least there was still “intelligent” packaging. Here we were going to get to that “smart” packaging everyone talks about.
“Intelligent” packaging, according to the brief on the report, was what “provides a safety net with such systems as time/temperature indicators, embedded microchips and transparent polymers and radio frequencies that identify the status of the food throughout the supply chain.”
“Embedded microchips” and all that cool stuff, now were talking…but how come we’ve never seen these at our grocery store if it’s such a huge market?
You’ve got to let the other shoe drop: “The intelligent packaging sector has been led by scan-code and electronic article surveillance (EAS) technologies (read: 1) tags-electronic sensors that are attached to merchandise; 2) deactivators and detachers-used to remove or inactivate the tags; and 3) systems that detect the tags at store exits.)
Geez, you mean to tell me the $25 billion intelligent packaging industry is just barcodes and those big, bulky tags attached to clothes at stores? What a let down.
Of course, BCC is entirely accurate in their report, or at least reasonably so. Unfortunately, the way these numbers get translated is that nanotechnologies in the form of little nanoscale sensors are being embedded into plastic packaging and are telling us the freshness of the food products we buy.
Just for the record, its just not happening now. It may happen, but those of us out there wondering why our grocery store isnt selling these nano-enabled packages need not feel left outnobody can buy them because there not for saleyet.
If you really want to know how and when nanotechnologies will be incorporated into food packaging, the place to find out is here.