East Africa’s Leading FMCG Packaging Manufacturer Silafrica Introduces Recyclable Multipurpose Crates

With food demand expected to grow by 77% over the next 28 years (2022-2050), the food industry is on a bull run. However, during this period, food production will be under a threat from climate change, competition for land uses, erosion and water scarcity. One of the solutions to this dilemma is increased efficiency and waste reduction in the food supply chain, which will result in a much higher food security index and higher margins for the food industry.

Food packaging solutions have a vital role to play in containing and protecting food while it moves through the supply chain to the consumer whether it’s packaging wrap, card boxes, cartons or plastic packaging. With different solutions and innovations in packaging materials and design being developed every day, this is providing new opportunities to improve efficiencies.

The main checkbox in packaging selection is farm produce protection. Sustainability is equally important as we don’t want to deplete our natural resources and leave a world where our next generation lacks the necessary resources to accomplish their goals. While in the past selecting packaging has required trade-offs between packaging sustainability and produce protection, current technologies make it possible to eat the cake and have it too.

Silafrica, the leading FMCG packaging manufacturer in East Africa, has collaborated with farmers to come up with two sustainable multipurpose crate designs that ensure minimum produce wastage during transit and storage. These are the nestable crates and the stackable crates.

As the name suggests, empty nestable crates can be nested together. This lowers the space requirement during returns. Low space requirement leads to lower transport costs, consequently reducing your operating expenses (OpEx). When coupled with increased volumes converted to sales due to better produce protection, you’re gaining more money in sales revenue while spending less money under OpEx, which is the holy grail in achieving higher margins!

Radio frequency identification tags can be attached to a dedicated space on the nestable crates to further allow for tracking thus fewer write-offs and more overall visibility over your supply chain cargo.

On the other hand, the stackable crates are partitioned into three parts, which allows for the packaging of up to three products in the same crate. This is specifically important in the last mile where goods are being transferred from point of sale to point of consumption or from an aggregation point to a fulfilment centre. In both cases, the quantities of a particular product needed could be small and therefore it would be more economical to transport multiple products in the same storage.

The two designs complement each other in that the nestable crates are ideal in the initial stages of the supply chain where mass transit of similar products/produce to aggregation centres/storage warehouses is the norm. From there, the stackable crates can be used to transport a mix of different products to fulfilment centres or points of sale or points of consumption.

ABOUT SILAFRICA: Headquartered in Kenya, Silafrica has been the leading manufacturer and supplier of the most innovative and sustainable rigid plastic packaging solutions for beverage, food, personal and home care, and chemicals since 1967 and a champion of circular economy.

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