Total Corbion PLA forays into Indian market with Konspec collaboration

The partnership aims to offer compounded PLA solutions for various applications and create ‘light-house projects’ (a closed-loop industry-exclusive pilot project) with specific sectors that are high on the plastic consumption cycle, and can be converted into a closed-loop of circular economy.

Stephane Dion, CEO, Total Corbion PLA, said, “PLA bioplastics offer concrete solutions to have a impact in terms of sustainability. As India is now focusing the industry’s attention towards finding sustainable solutions, Total Corbion PLA is keen to work with the industry and various stakeholders across the value chain, through our technical collaborator Konspec, on pilot projects to create tailor-made solutions.

The projects include a waste–to–wealth program where the waste can be re-acquired and recycled or converted into energy, or composted and returned to the soil as fertiliser.

Vinod Bondal, CEO, Konspec, said, “India is on a cusp of revolutionising and reimagining possibilities using biodegradable plastics by evaluating sustainable solutions in the areas of flexible and rigid packaging. This provides an opportunity to work with brand owners and relevant stakeholders to create sustainable solutions that progress towards a circular economy and esnure a robust waste–to–wealth plan.”

Total Corbion PLA has a bioplastics production facility in Thailand that produces a broad range of Luminy PLA resins from renewable, non-GMO sugarcane sourced locally in Thailand. The facility has enabled a global production capacity of PLA bioplastics to increase by almost 50%, to 2,40,000 tonnes per year.

“We are confident that PLA will enable manufacturers and brand owners to move into the circular economy and produce biobased products with lower carbon footprints and multiple end of life options,” added Dion.

As a first step, Total Corbion and Konspec have been speaking to several airports, FMCG companies, hospitality chains, footwear companies, food aggregators, and others, for setting-up the light-house projects.

“Konspec is privileged to collaborate with Total Corbion to offer sustainable and environmentally friendly biodegradable and compostable solutions for the flexible and rigid packaging industries . We are enthused by the response about its adaption through various sectoral conversations we have been initiating over the last few months. The opportunities across railways, airlines, airports, hotels, FMCG and even food aggregators among others are immense and promising,” Bondal cocluded.