The growing environmental degradation is massively pushing up the demand for sustainable and eco-friendly solutions and materials. Moreover, in many countries, the rising volume of landfills is rapidly becoming a major issue and thus, it is making the governments and regulatory authorities implement strict environmental regulations and launch huge public awareness campaigns regarding the use of environment-friendly materials. Because of these factors, the usage of corrugated packaging materials is rising, particularly for non-durable consumer products.
In addition to the aforementioned factor, the rising industrialization, especially in the developing countries, increasing international trade activities, surging per capita income, and expansion of various industries such as oil and gas, energy, and chemicals are also boosting the demand for corrugated packaging solutions across the world. According to the World Factbook of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), “China’s industrial production was valued at $3.7 trillion, as compared to that of the U.S. with $2.9 trillion, in 2012.”
The growth of the e-commerce industry is another major factor responsible for the burgeoning requirement for corrugated packaging materials. Due to their light weight and low-cost availability, these materials are increasingly being adopted by e-commerce companies for packaging products. Moreover, the usage of these packaging materials allows companies to provide faster home-delivery of products, which, in turn, helps them attain higher customer satisfaction and revenue growth than what was possible with the utilization of conventional packaging materials.
The ballooning usage of corrugated packaging materials is causing a sharp rise in their sales, which is, in turn, causing the surge of the global corrugated packaging market. Processed food, beverages, fresh food and produce, chemicals, personal and household care, electrical and electronics items, paper products, ceramics and glassware, wood and timber, tobacco, direct mail and dispatch, textiles, transport, furniture, apparel, and footwear are the major application areas of these materials.
Out of these, the usage of these materials was found to be significantly high in processed food in the years gone by. This is because the packaging of processed food items requires flexible and secure packaging materials such as corrugated packaging boxes and other materials for ensuring high product safety and customer convenience. According to PS Intelligence, a market research firm based in India, the corrugated packaging market will demonstrate huge expansion in Asia-Pacific (APAC) in the coming years.
The progress of the market in this region will be driven by the rising requirement for packaging materials in the processed food industry, especially in India and China. The corrugated packaging market will boom in China in the forthcoming years, on account of the soaring industrial production in the country. Japan will also observe rapid expansion of the industry in the upcoming years, on account of the country being a leading exporter of automotive parts and consumer electronics goods.
Therefore, it can be said without any hesitation that the sales of corrugated packaging materials will climb in the near future, because of the growing requirement for sustainable and eco-friendly packaging materials in the food processing, e-commerce, and consumer electronics industries and the higher flexibility and protection provided by these materials to the packaged goods than the traditionally used ones.
