Forest Essentials tie up with RIL to recycle Plastic Waste Packaging

28 September 2020: To reduce plastic waste in the context of growing environmental challenges and strengthening its policies towards eco-friendly packaging and organized recycling, Forest Essentials has partnered with Reliance Industries Ltd. (RIL). As one of the global leaders in the PET manufacturing space, RIL will undertake recycling of waste plastic packaging for Forest Essentials products and convert the plastic into high-quality eco-friendly materials.

Through this partnership, Forest Essentials will set up a collection facility in each of their stores across the country, starting with a few cities and slowly expanding to a PAN India presence. Customers will be encouraged to drop empty jars and bottle of the Brand at select stores via an empties collection and reward programme. Reliance will then effectively re-purpose the recyclable plastic processing it into secondary applications such as new fibres, bottles, containers, carpets, clothing, industrial strapping, rope, upholstery fabrics, boat sails, automotive parts, fibrefill for winter jackets, sleeping bags, construction materials and other such items.

Forest Essentials has completely eliminated shrink wrap earlier used to protect bottles in transit, thus reducing plastic usage of Forest Essentials by 70% while air wrap bubbles have been replaced by air filled pouches.

Reliance Industries has been a pioneer in setting up plastic bottle recycling unit in 2002. It currently recycle more than 2 billion PET bottles per annum across India to produce R|Elan GreenGold – one of the greenest fabrics in the world. Reliance plans to increase recycling capacity to 5 billion bottles. With its state-of-the-art, fully integrated plastic recycling facilities in Nagothane, Barabanki and Hoshiarpur, Reliance works closely with vendors spread across India to collect waste PET materials.