Much to be said for wine going plastic

MPACT, one of SA’S largest paper and plastic packaging businesses, which was spun off from Mondi last year, is making a splash in the form of polyethylene terephthalate (PET) wine bottles that do not, the company says, affect the quality and taste of wine in any way.

While dispensing wine from plastic may not be everyone’s cup of tea, the design of Mpact’s PET bottles prevents the absorption of oxygen, giving the wine a shelf life exceeding two years. And it’s also greener to make and transport. The bottles are an average eight times lighter than a standard glass bottle, weighing 50g rather than 400g. This means up to 36% more product can be moved from manufacturer to customer, because the bottles need significantly less space on trucks.

Mpact says internationally there has been a trend towards plastic wine bottles, having itself recently won an overall Gold Pack Trophy for a plastic wine bottle designed for Jet blue, a low-cost American airline. Indeed, plastic wine bottles make eminently good sense for the airline industry for reasons of both safety and efficiency of transport. Mpact’s Georgian Green 750ml PET wine bottle launched by Simonsvlei won a prestigious Worldstar award last year from the World Packaging Organisation. In the same year its 750ml Rappet wine bottle for Backsberg Tread Lightly won an Ipsa Gold Pack Awards gold medal.

Plastic wine containers have come a long way from the papsak. PHARMACEUTICAL companies have long complained that the Medicines Control Council’s ever-lengthening delays in registering new products are stifling business. Yesterday, Adcock Ingram cast the problems posed by the capacity constraints in a fresh light.

The company has locked horns with the council over the safety of its painkillers containing dextropropoxyphene (DPP) since the end of 2010, and the issue is still hanging.

The outcome is important, as the drugs were widely prescribed for postoperative pain relief, and their removal from the market has hit Adcock Ingram hard. In the six months to March, Adcock Ingram estimates the loss of Synap Forte, Lentogesic and Doxyfene sales has cost it R55m.

At the heart of the debate are questions about DPP painkillers raising the risk of heart attacks: the US Food and Drug Administration believes they do, a position that initially prompted the council to ask companies that sold such drugs to voluntarily withdraw them. But Adcock Ingram maintains the pills are safe, and both parties have research to back up their positions.

But there is a broader question as to whether the council is able to do its job effectively. It cancelled the registration of DPP-containing drugs in April last year, prompting an appeal by Adcock Ingram which has yet to be heard. The council has not even set a hearing date, so don’t expect an answer to this one any time soon.