Sustainability

GOOD FOR YOU + GOOD FOR THE ENVIRONMENT

At Nandan Tea, our sustainability strategy prioritizes solutions that are kind to the planet. Our sustainability framework guides us to make eco-conscious decisions every step of the way to make meaningful environmental and social impact. We want to ensure that the net result of us doing business is a positive one, beyond just providing our customers with a delicious cup of tea.

OUR TEA - ETHICAL TEA TASTES BETTER

We support fair and ethical treatment of workers wherever we do business. That's why we consciously choose partners whose eco-values align with ours. By supporting family farms that produce tea with a vested economic and social interest, 100% of our current tea collection is certified by the Ethical Tea Partnership (ETP). The farms provide safe working conditions and fair compensation to workers in addition to providing housing, medical care, education and infrastructure support. The farms we source from have a working environmental management system that include ecosystem and water conservation, integrated soil, crop and waste management.

Our tea is processed in a carbon-negative facility powered by solar electricity, which avoids substantial emissions each year. The monthly impact is equivalent to planting 750 trees, saving 77,000 litres (20,000 gallons) of water and 11,500 litres (3,000 gallons) of gas. This initiative reduces the environmental footprint and promotes sustainable manufacturing practices.

Image Source: Flexible Packaging Association

OUR PACKAGING

Growth in online and mobile shopping worldwide has huge ramifications for packaging. Fortunately, the rising demand for sustainable materials is creating huge opportunities for many material suppliers to develop and innovate packaging solutions specifically geared towards e-commerce applications as the market expands further. The world of sustainability is stocked with eco-phrases such as recycled, recyclable, compostable, biodegradable, oxo-biodegradable, zero waste, plastic free and more.

As we navigate these terms within the industry, we realize that there is no 'one-size-fits-all' solution. Here is an overview of core factors driving our sustainability principles:

TYPE OF PACKAGING

Our tea is supplied in environment-friendly kraft stand-up flexible pouches. Flexible packaging is growing worldwide at a faster rate than rigid packaging in many applications.

The Flexible Packaging Association conducted several real-world e-commerce application case studies showing that flexible packaging has significantly better environmental attributes.

The traditional flexible packages incorporate multi-material and multi-layer films, which provide high barrier protection against moisture, oxygen and light, keeping products fresh for longer, reducing product waste, and enhancing flavor. However, these are very difficult to recycle and have poorer economics of recovery (very little plastic recovered for a lot of effort).

We are committing to recyclable mono-material constructions by 2030, principally driven by our sustainability agenda.

PACKAGING MATERIAL

We challenge ourselves to progress our packaging, like using oxo-degradable flexible packaging and increasing post-consumer recycled content.

Our tea is supplied in oxo-degradable paper bags labelled "Bak2earth".

• Bak2earth is made with up to 60% {by weight} renewable wood pulp starch. These bags are tested with USA ASTM D-6868 and D-6400 standards, which confirm that 100% of the wood pulp starch-based portion will be dissolved in healthy compost in approximately 180 days with a composting environment facility.

• Balance 40% {by weight} of packaging contains an additive that enhances degradation / biodegradation and helps breakdown over approximately twelve years.

SHIPPING MAILERS

Our direct-to-consumer shipping mailers are made of 100% recycled content, are curbside recyclable and made in North America. We are utilizing as much recycled content as possible so the packaging has the best chance to become something useful in its next life and does not waste away in landfills.

Recycled content is more energy, carbon and resource-efficient and reduces water consumption. Raw virgin materials aren't harvested to make something new, and recycling markets are strengthened. After "reuse," recycle is the next most optimal end-of-life scenario. Curbside recyclable means that you can put the item in the mixed recycling or blue bin where these items are far more likely to actually be recycled.

You can use the Sustainability Savings Calculator to quantify your impact on the planet when you order from Nandan Tea. By choosing recycled, you save (assuming one order per week; calculations are for annual savings):

PRODUCT AND SHIPPING LABELS

Our product and shipping labels are paper-based. However, we are committed to using shipping labels made from 100% post-consumer waste white paper by 2030. These are 100% recycled and curbside recyclable, unlike traditional silicone-coated release liners.

10.87 lbs of wood, equivalent to 0.03 trees

16.25 lbs of CO2-eq, same as co2 from 0.83 gallons of gasoline

0.02 million BTUs of electricity, enough to power avg US household for 0.15 days

17.39 gallons of water, enough water for 1.66, 5 minute showers

You can have peace of mind knowing you're doing your part in purchasing earth-friendly packaging.

Image: Back2earth packaging

MUNICIPAL WASTE PROGRAMS

While stand-up pouches are more environment-friendly and sustainable option compared to other kinds of packaging, most blue bin programs generally aren't set up to deal with the pouches. Most provinces require the stand-up pouches to be placed in the garbage as recycling multiple parts and materials can be quite complex, but some recycling programs require drop-offs at their depots. If recycling a material is too costly and the recovered material is too hard to turn into new products, the local governments send them to the landfill instead.

It can be confusing to know what gets recycled, composted or disposed of as trash. As consumers, we often inadvertently end up contaminating the local blue box program. To help, most municipalities in Canada have created waste wizard to understand how to dispose of something properly. However, it is clear that the local governments need to step up their blue box recycling program to expand the materials list and allow more materials to be recycled, keep them out of landfills and stop them from littering the environment. But low demand for the recycled materials means that much of it ends up in landfills anyway, despite best intentions.

Given that most resealable flexible packaging is not accepted in blue bin programs within Canada, we decided to use packaging predominantly made of renewable wood pulp starch and an additive that helps break down the packaging way faster. After all, it doesn't need to last forever.

As we continue to learn more about sustainable packaging options, we are dedicated to putting the environment first. We are committing to refillable mono-material packaging that allows for infinite reusability and recyclability by 2030.

Image: The Waste Hierarchy

OUR VISION

Ultimately, our vision is for Nandan tea to become a driver for change in the tea industry. Sustainability matters to us. With a trend towards packaging recyclability gathering speed, we are committing to 100% recyclable packaging by 2030.

We acknowledge that we have a long way to go before realizing that ambition or making a meaningful impact on the issues that the industry faces. We do pride ourselves on being aware of the problems and are committed to actively and steadily working towards it. As with all things, we believe efforts to move forward towards sustainable packaging goals should not be stifled by the fear of making imperfect decisions! Positive progress is always better than no forward movement at all. We continue to make ongoing efforts of improving, sharing and learning through research about developments in the industry, so we are at the forefront of making Nandan Tea truly sustainable.