There is also general agreement that the whole package-product system must also be considered sustainable. If this package system fails to provide adequate protection for the goods it contains it is not really sustainable at all, as in this case both package and product will be wasted. When it comes to the proper role of biodegradable plastics in sustainable packaging systems, there is much less agreement.
Before discussing biodegradability in more detail, one important point must be made: considerations of biodegradability fundamentally deal only with the end of life of the packaging system. It has been well established that in many cases, environmental impacts associated with packaging production are significantly larger than those associated with end of life (recycling, composting, landfill, etc.)…Therefore, at the outset we must agree that the impacts of biodegradability are only a part (often a small part) of overall sustainability of packaging systems.
