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Notpla food cartons and paper

Notpla food containers are home compostable in four to six weeks, says Simon Eccles

The containers are folded and glued
trays, some with lids, that can be used in
place of the now-banned expanded foam
trays, or cardboard trays with laminated
plastic barriers. The packs are fully
approved for food-contact and offer an oil
barrier function that Notpla claims outper-
forms plastic in most applications.
“Most takeaway food packaging relies on
chemical or bioplastic linings, which pre-
vent recycling and can take years to break
down, leaching forever-chemicals and
microplastics into nature,” says Russell.
“Notpla’s coated board provides the same
grease and moisture resistance but is plas-
tic-free, biodegradable, and home-com-
What does it do? Notpla quotes estimates that all single- postable. It can be used in the same way as
Notpla is a British start-up company use plastics could be replaced by farming existing coated boards in the market, man-
that has developed seaweed and other and harvesting seaweed from just ufactured and converted in existing indus-
plant-based, fully biodegradable alterna- 0.066% of the total ocean space – mainly try facilities.
tives to plastics for packaging and other Specifications around coastlines for obvious practical Notpla’s coated board complies with
applications. It calls this “disappearing reasons.
packaging”. In 2022 it won one of the Food containers The product range so far includes European EC 1935/2004 and US FDA
Earthshot Prize environmental awards Board types White Notpla Coating, for fully biodegradeable 21CFR176.170 regulations for food contact
instigated by Prince William, and late last or brown kraft takeaway food containers; Notpla Paper, materials. As with any food packaging, vir-
year featured on a documentary on BBC using leftover seaweed fibres; Notpla gin fibres rather than recycled are a neces-
TV that followed some of the prize win- Formats Straight or Film for flexible packaging; Notpla Rigid, sity. The boards are FSC-certified and
ners. Notpla had won the ‘Build a Waste- curved trays in a an injection mouldable material for cut- comply with EN 13430 (recyclability) and
free World’ prize of £1m. The company range of sizes and lery and the like; Notpla Pipette for sin- BPI Industrial Compostability (US).
was founded by Pierre Paslier and shapes (eg for gle-serve edible oils; Notpla Pearls After nine months testing, the Dutch gov-
Rodrigo Garcia Gonzalez. They met burgers or hot single-dose spheres; and the original
while studying Innovation Design dogs), some with Ooho edible capsules (pictured at top of ernment acknowledged Notpla Coating as
Engineering at Imperial College London integral lids. p91). the first and, so far, only plastic-free mate-
and the Royal College of Art, where in Custom formats can Here we’re looking at two of the prod- rial to meet the strict EU Single-Use
be ordered.
2013 they developed Ooho, a seaweed- ucts with relevance to printing and pack- Plastics Directive standards.
based edible container for single-shot Contact Notpla aging: a series of water and greaseproof
drinks or sauces. They described seaweed www.notpla.com coated cardboard food containers, and Recycling or composting
as “a miracle crop possessing all the nec- the range of printable papers. The boxes are recyclable through stand-
essary qualities for natural packaging, it’s 800x1,800x1,400mm ard paper recycling streams if free of exces-
incredibly flexible and strong, provides a When was it introduced and what are
natural barrier and – most importantly – the target markets? sive food contamination. They are also
the ability to take on new shapes.” “The range has been commercially avail- home-compostable in four to six weeks, or
They set up Notpla in 2019 in Hackney able since 2022 and is aimed at the food ser- industrially compostable. Even without
Wick, east London, where they have vice industry, including takeaway active composting, di scarded packs break
developed further products from sea- restaurants, catering businesses, and event down in nature, leaving no microplastics or
weeds and plants. They stress that this is catering,” says Niall Russell, Notpla’s head harmful residues. “We call it ‘guilt-free dis-
not a ‘bioplastic’, such as PLA (polylactic of marketing. “Over 15m units have been posal,’ which is helpful for businesses and
acid), saying: “We share similar status used to date, to replace single-use plastics consumers when waste management is
with natural organic materials, just like a and we expect to replace another 100m in
fruit peel.” 2025.” inconsistent,” says Russell.
“The range has been commercially available since 2022 and is aimed at the food service industry.”

30 PrintWeek MENA February 2026 www.printweekmena.com