approximately a third of consumer waste is food packaging, and the most of it cannot be recycled. however, finding ways to trim down that waste and its influence on the environment and the economy is the focus of a new research center that is being created at rit. gifts calculating 2.2 million from the american packaging corp. and wegman family charitable foundation will help to build the center for sustainable packaging. it will be an education and research center dedicated for the use and development of sustainable packaging. this center will also be a testing ground for new solutions and ideas for faculty, students, researchers, and corporate partners that are fascinated in sustainable packaging. it will also coach the next generation of packaging professionals&rsquo objective on bringing sustainable ideology to producers around the world. rochesterbased american packaging corp. is a longtime partner of the university. it donated 1 million in 2007 to found the american packaging corp. center for the purpose of packaging innovation in the college of applied science and technology of university. work in this center focuses on materialscience issues within the area of packaging. the company has also given a supplementary 1.2 million gift to continue support of the established center and to help build the new rit center for sustainable packaging. these two centers will team up on joint development initiatives. peter schottland is the chief executive officer and president of american packaging corp. he mentions that the different components of the foodpackaging supply chain are siloed, and each component works to make the best of its own results, without a similar goal of sustainability. he also said the most excellent ideas across the industry are essential to make the maximum development on sustainable packaging. in a condition where the industry is aligned, experiments happen, knowledge is shared, economies of scale are overcome, and results agreed upon. for this initiative, a contribution of 1 million came from the wegman family charitable foundation. danny wegman is the chairman of the board of the wegman family charitable foundation. danny says that, in association with the center for packaging innovation, this new initiative will make rit and rochester a destination for manufacturers, retailers, and students who have an interest in sustainable packaging. danny also said that support for inventive approaches to education is a key area for their foundation and the rit center for sustainable packaging has the ability to be on the front position of changes that will influence the future in a significant way. this is not being the first time when the two companies have associated with the university and its students. in the last many years, american packaging corp. has given financial support for design competitions for students in packaging science. in recent times, wegmans food markets partnered with american packaging and rit for a design competition that involved students from the packaging program and those from industrial design and graphic design, which are programs in rit&rsquos college of imaging arts and sciences. rit will bring facilities and research capabilities, faculty expertise, focused on the development of new materials, and designs and processes to the project. research efforts will be a combination of nearterm fixes and longterm efforts that are focused on lessening the carbon footprint that is required to package and deliver supremequality products to the consumer. rit president bill destler says that this program strikes directly at the core of rit&rsquos educational mission. the center for sustainable packaging will place students on the front line of applied research. it allows producers to provide consumers with inventive products while counterbalancing society&rsquos impact on the lessening of vital resources, bill further said. through industry networks and collaborative partnerships, the center will speed up the development of useful solutions in sustainable packaging. he also said that rit is very grateful to the american packaging and wegman family charitable foundation for their support. the wegman family charitable foundation is headquartered in rochester, new york. it was formed in 1991 by robert wegman and is being sponsored by assets from his estate. source of information httpwww.rit.edunewsstory.phpid49395
