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The World Packaging Organisation (WPO) has revealed the winners of WorldStar 2022, for which packages are eligible to enter if they have already received a national or regional award such as Packaging Europe’s Sustainability Awards.

According to the WPO, there were 240 winners at WorldStar Packaging Awards 2022, with Germany, Australia and New Zealand, Japan, and China representing the most awarded countries. The winners of the President’s Award, Sustainability Award, Marketing Award, and Packaging that Saves Food Award will be announced during the WorldStar Ceremony in May 2022.

Soha Atallah, vice president of conferences, exhibitions, and awards and coordinator of WorldStar, comments: “Sustainability and convenience were among the main focus for most of the entries in WorldStar 2022 in addition to other post Covid-19 trends such as hygiene, e-commerce, and wellness.

“The outstanding number of entries and the quality of the packages make us believe that the global packaging industry is on the right path: to provide the world more innovative and sustainable solutions that can impact positively in food waste reduction and save food initiatives, guaranteeing more food for more people.”

Winners of Packaging Europe’s Sustainability Awards are eligible for WorldStar, and a number of innovations shortlisted for the Sustainability Awards 2021 – with the winners announced earlier this year at FachPack – were also recognised at WorldStar 2022.

For example, Nestlé’s paper packaging for Smarties, which was nominated in the Recyclable Packaging category at the Sustainability Awards 2021, was nominated in the Food category at WorldStar 2022. Also in the Food category at WorldStar 2022, Huhtamaki’s fibre-based beverage and sundae cups for McDonald’s won in the Sustainability Award’s Bio-Based category, while watttron’s digital, temperature-controlled sealing solution was the winner in our Machinery category.

For its Dynamic Packaging Configuration X Big Data innovation, meal kit provider HelloFresh won in both the Resource Efficiency category at the Sustainability Awards 2021 and in the E-Commerce category at WorldStar 2022.

Packaging Europe’s Readers’ Award – the winners of which are selected by our audience – was this year given to Procter and Gamble’s scaled refillable bottle system, which offers consumers reusable aluminium bottles and refill pouches for brands including Head & Shoulders, Aussie, and Pantene. The same innovation won in the Packaging Materials and Components category at WorldStar 2022.

Mibelle Group’s PET bottle made from 30% CO2 was the winner of the Pre-Commercialised Innovation Award at the Sustainability Awards 2021, which went on to be recognised in the Household category at WorldStar 2022.

Finally, the overall winner of the Sustainability Awards 2021, the NETXLOOP project by Nextek, which creates food-grade packaging from recycled PP, also won in the Packaging Materials and Components category at WorldStar 2022.

This means the winners from six different categories of the Sustainability Awards 2021 have also won at WPO’s WorldStar 2022. The other WorldStar 2022 winners can be found on its website.  

Submissions for Packaging Europe’s Sustainability Awards 2022 will open in January 2022. Stay tuned, and head over to our LinkedIn and Twitter channels, for more information.