Packaging have become an environmental problem since mishandling causes pollution, and end-of-life treatments contribute to climate change. Even so, packaging is still necessary in our market system as they protect, distribute and prolong the life of various products. Policy-makers, companies, and the scientific community, are therefore working on different ways to combat the negative impacts of packaging, creating frameworks and strategies to facilitate a sustainable development. However, there seems to be a misalignment in the process of developing packaging with sustainable characteristics, since the realization of sustainable packaging is limited. The aim of this study is therefore to explain the limitation of realized sustainable packaging, by exploring the misalignment in the realization process through a single case study. The empirical data was collected from a company with the ambition of realizing sustainable packaging. Primary data was gathered through open-ended interviews with employees, and through internal and public documents. Furthermore, secondary data regarding the context of sustainable packaging and also scientific studies about packaging, sustainability and product development were reviewed and analyzed. The process of realizing sustainable packaging is regarded as a system that is dependent on outputs from different levels: i) its surrounding environment- the context, ii) the system goal- the strategy, and iii) the internal rules- operational aspects. The study results in three propositions that explain how a misalignment of the different levels causes a limitation of realized sustainable packaging. P1) A misalignment between the sustainable packaging context, and the sustainability strategy, results in a strategy that points in the wrong direction, P2) a misalignment between the sustainability strategy and the requirement specification, might result in greenwashed packaging, and P3) qualitatively ill formulated sustainability requirements might result in a missed target. This study argues that in order to increase the capability of the realization process the levels need to be aligned. Also, that creating qualitatively well formulated requirements might be seen as a tool in the process of realizing sustainable packaging.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:uu-413354 |
| Date | January 2020 |
| Creators | Wiil, Madelene |
| Publisher | Uppsala universitet, Institutionen för geovetenskaper |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
| Relation | Examensarbete vid Institutionen för geovetenskaper, 1650-6553 ; 2020/29 |
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