The discovery of hot water with coffee aroma in capsules, the business of the century. Dizzying profits, environmental costs and health risks outsourced to the community. To the consumers, some ideas to reflect on.
Capsule coffee, market data
One third of the market of coffee in Western Europe - in value, out of a total of about 18 billion euros - is represented by capsules and pods. The segment continues to grow at a rapid pace (+ 9% per year, the 2011-2017 average), in a sector that is vice versa stable (+ 1,6% in the same period). (1) In Italy in 2018 alone, the growth of the capsule segment was 10 times higher than that of ground coffee, + 14,6% vs. + 1,4%. (2)
Globally, sales are expected to double in the 2017-2025 period, from US $ 15,23 to US $ 29,2 billion. (3) The coffee capsules continue to lead the way, as the growth in turnover is accompanied by operating margins of over 50%. (4) It is no coincidence that the Nestlé group - leader in the food industry - has concentrated most of its investments on Nespresso. Which in turn, ca va sans dire, dominates the scene.
Everything good? The roasting industries and the various distribution channels grind profits, but the greenwashing flooding their manuals with CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) it will never be able to compensate for the unsustainable impact of this consumption model on the environment and health.
Capsules, what environmental impact?
Insert the case of colored aluminum and press the button. The electric trinket shoots the liquid, hot but not too hot. They call it 'espresso', it's found everywhere it's impossible to go wrong. You just have to spend, the more the cartridge costs, the higher the score. A small bourgeois luxury that is increasingly inevitable, 'almost as good as at the bar'in the rhetoric of its followers. In fact, they now compare the exorbitant costs of the 'single dose' with those of the espresso at the counter, rather than with ground coffee in packs of 250 or 500 g.
Hundreds of millions of consumers around the world every day insert a disposable capsule into a small appliance, and then send tens of thousands of tons of their packaging - not reusable - to landfills and incinerators. Some giants pride themselves on using 'recyclable' aluminum, without however guaranteeing that the containers are actually destined for recycling (as should be done, introducing deposit-security obligations). Nor to explain that reusing metal involves further wastes of resources and emissions, as used 'shells' must be transported, shredded, washed with water to remove coffee, burned to remove paint, before the aluminum can be melted. Others use bioplastic capsules and compostable materials, with the promise of mitigating the environmental impact of the phenomenon. However, except hindering the production of compost in its final sieving phase.
Il Life Cycle Assessment of the coffee capsules it is inevitably disastrous. The materials most used to produce single-dose, non-reusable containers derive from non-renewable sources. Aluminum, polyethylene (PE) and polyethylene terephthalate (PET), i.e. minerals, petroleum and polluting materials. Producing materials and containers, even if derived from biopolymers, has a significant energy cost and involves equally significant CO2 emissions. The environment must then bear the costs of secondary packaging, the luxurious cases of the extensive collections of 'personalized' blends. And so cards, inks, energy and emissions, disposal. Last but not least the transport of light and bulky packages.
Wastes, objectives and prevention measures
Reduce the production and consumption of what is not strictly indispensable is the first imperative of circular economy and sustainable development. The directive 'on packaging and packaging waste ' - object of recent reform, in 2018, with the 'circular economy package ' - prescribes the following.
'Member States ensure that […] other measures are implemented prevention aimed at preventing the production of packaging waste and minimizing the environmental impact of packaging. Such other preventive measures may consist of national programs, incentives provided through extended producer responsibility aimed at minimizing the environmental impact of packaging or in similar actions taken, where appropriate, after consultation with economic operators, environmental organizations and consumers, and aimed at grouping and exploiting the many initiatives taken on the territory of the Member States in the sector of prevention '. (5)
Reuse is the second diktat. The design of processes, flows and products must first of all avoid the unnecessary and minimize the indispensable. The next step, in the logic of circular economy, is the design of objects with the logic of favoring their reuse.
'In accordance with the waste hierarchy established in Article 4 of Directive 2008/98 / EC, Member States shall take measures to encourage an increase in the percentage of reusable packaging placed on the market, as well as systems for the re-use of packaging in an environmentally sound and Treaty-compliant manner , without compromising food hygiene or consumer safety. These measures may include, inter alia:
a) the use of deposit return systems;
b) the setting of qualitative or quantitative objectives;
c) the use of economic incentives;
d) setting a minimum percentage of reusable packaging placed on the market each year for each packaging stream '. (6)
The European legislator, in invoking noble concepts such as the 'sustainable bio-economy ', has been careful not to prescribe specific measures and binding targets to the Member States on the two cornerstones of the waste hierarchy, reduction and reuse. business is business, and current politics pursues its priorities as opposed to the common good. The aforementioned directive thus leaves the Member States carte blanche, limiting themselves to defining the recycling targets for materials (plastic, wood, ferrous materials, aluminum, paper and cardboard).
Coffee, ecological innovation?
Ecological innovation on coffee capsules is led by some large Italian roasting companies. Vergnano was the first to create a compostable capsule, which can be disposed of in the organic waste fraction without being separated from the coffee. Lavazza, leader Italian market, has then developed together with Novamont the capsule in bioplastic MaterBi, biodegradable and compostable. The University of Tor Vergata in Rome has in turn created a new system that uses PLA (polylactic acid, made by fermenting sugary raw materials).
Such an approach it is undoubtedly appreciable, since it avoids consuming bauxite (basic raw material of aluminum) and / or oil and hydrocarbons. Nonetheless, as we have seen, recyclable capsules lack the primary objectives of reducing and reusing packaging materials. In addition to burdening the recycling plants to a much greater extent than the wet and paper with which the coffee pods are made, which can also flow into the wet. To consumers, once again, the responsibility of making a daily choice. Knowing that for the environment the 'George Clooney model' is the most burdensome, the mocha and the real espresso are the favorites, the pod in the middle between.
Coffee capsules and health risks
The consumption of coffee in capsuleslast but not least, it presents some health risks. Due to the presence of a family of carcinogenic and genotoxic organic compounds - furans and methylfurans - in quantities up to 10 times higher than in ground coffee. (7) To this contribute to temperatures and roasting times, as well as the hermetic closure in the containers which prevents the dispersion of these highly volatile substances. The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) has confirmed the long-term danger of liver damage associated with exposure to these substances. (8) EFSA could not establish a tolerable daily dose, as it could not rule out that cancer arises due to a direct interaction of furans with DNA.
'Like the committee of experts Joint FAO / WHO on Food Additives (JECFA), we concluded that the level of exposure to furan in food indicates a human health problem ' (Dr. Helle Knutsen, President of the Panel of Experts on Contaminants in the Food Supply Chain, 25.10.17). (9)
The European Commission led by Jean Claude Juncker - with EU regulation 2017/2158 which entered into force on 11.4.18 - limited itself to establishing 'mitigation measures' and 'reference levels'. Without even distinguishing the coffee in capsules from the ground coffee, in the field of application and thus in the monitoring to be performed. (10) This is the power of LOBBY di Big food in Brussels, POP (Profit Over People). Once again mild measures, without binding measures on unacceptable levels of contamination, in relation to genotoxic and carcinogenic substances. In the case of furans, as in those ofacrylamide and to the was mineral in food. (11)
It's all so simple, POP! But is it really worth it?
Dario Dongo
Footnotes
(1) Rabobank (2018). How Coffee Will Look Different in Ten Years, https://research.rabobank.com/far/en/sectors/beverages/How_Coffee_Will_Look_Different_in_Ten_Years.html
(2) GDO News, 29.11.18, Coffee capsules: a giant market, those without financial strength are destined to disappear. Latest market data
(3) Fiormarkets (2019). Global Coffee Pod and Capsule Market by Product Type (Coffee Capsules, Coffee Pods), Application Type (Coffee Beans, Coffee Powder), Material (Conventional Plastic, Others), Region Global Industry Analysis, Market Size, Share, Growth, Trends, and Forecast 2018 to 2025, https://www.fiormarkets.com/report-detail/375940/request-sample
(4) Nestlé keeps its gross margins confidential in this one business units. About 85%, according to the study of prof. Frank Matzler (2013) Business model innovation: coffee triumphs for Nespresso. Journal of Business Strategy, Vol. 34 No. 2 2013, pp. 30-37, Q Emerald Group Publishing Limited, ISSN 0275-6668 doi: 10.1108 / 02756661311310431
Approximately 50%, according to a student of the Digital Innovation and Transformation Course, Harvard Business School. Rpark submission (2018). B.rewing to Successful Future at Nespresso?, https://digit.hbs.org/submission/brewing-a-successful-future-at-nespresso/
(5) See dir. EU 2018/852 'of the European Parliament and of the Council of 30 May 2018 amending Directive 94/62 / EC on packaging and packaging waste ', new article 4.1
(6) See dir. EU 2018/852, new article 5 - Reuse
(7) MS Altaki et al. (2011). Occurrence of furan in coffee from Spanish market: Contribution of brewing and roasting. Food Chemistry Vol 126, Issue 4, 15 June 2011, Pages 1527-1532. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foodchem.2010.11.134
(8) EFSA, Contaminants Panel. (2017) Risks for public health related to the presence of furan and methylfurans in food. EFSA Journal 25 October 2017 doi: 10.2903 / j.efsa.2017.5005
(9) EFSA, press release 25.10.17, https://www.efsa.europa.eu/en/press/news/171025
(10) See reg. EU 2017/2158 'establishing mitigation measures and reference levels for the reduction of acrylamide in food', article 1, paragraph 2, letters 'f' and 'g'
(11) Even worse is the willful omission of any measure to protect European consumers - and children in particular - from the serious risks associated with the contribution of process contaminants, also genotoxic and carcinogenic, that refined palm oil contains in 6-10 times higher quantity than other refined vegetable oils. This is not the Europe we want! See the previous article https://www.greatitalianfoodtrade.it/idee/palma-leaks-grande-puzza-di-bruciato-anche-a-bruxelles
Dario Dongo, lawyer and journalist, PhD in international food law, founder of WIISE (FARE - GIFT - Food Times) and Égalité.
