Our vacuum bags are designed for polyethylene recycling, and we already recycle our own production waste. Here is what that means, what it doesn’t yet mean, and how we’re closing the gap.
Meat and cheese processors, brand owners and retailers increasingly ask us: “Is your vacuum bag recyclable?” The honest answer is that “recyclable” means two things. Technical recyclability asks whether the material can be reprocessed into new products. Practical recyclability asks whether it is actually collected and recycled after use, at scale. Our bags pass the first test today. This post explains why, and how we plan to earn the second.
What’s in a Sun Plastics vacuum bag
Our vacuum bags are made on 7-layer coextrusion lines. By mass, the film is 88.6% low-density polyethene (LDPE) and 11.4% nylon (polyamide, PA), coextruded together with no laminating adhesives or foil.
Nylon provides the oxygen barrier that protects shelf life and the puncture resistance needed around bone-in meat and hard cheese. A bag that fails in the cold chain wastes the food inside it, which carries a far larger footprint than the film. Because the structure is almost 90% polyethene, it belongs in the PE film recycling stream. The question is whether 11.4% nylon holds that stream back.
“Europe says barrier films must use EVOH”: not quite
Many in our industry believe European rules only accept PE barrier films with EVOH at 5% or less. That 5% figure is a limit on EVOH, not a ban on nylon. Nylon is assessed separately, and the evidence has moved in its favour:
• RecyClass rates PA6 and PA6/66 barrier layers in PE films as “limited compatible” under set conditions covering nylon grade, content and tie-layer compatibiliser.• CEFLEX D4ACE (2025) allows PA6 in PE up to 35% with specific tie layers. Its testing fed into the CEN standards that will support the EU’s Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation.• Germany’s minimum standard recognises coextruded PE/PA films as recyclable, backed by independent cyclos-HTP testing.The common thread is the compatibiliser. A PE-g-MAH tie layer binds nylon and polyethene so that, when the film is re-extruded, the nylon disperses finely instead of forming gels. A well-designed coextruded PE/PA film at our nylon level sits within the range European guidelines now accept. We are verifying our exact structure against these criteria.
Why chemistry alone doesn’t make a bag “recyclable” in South Africa
South Africa, rightly, defines “recyclable” by what happens in practice:
• SANS/ISO 14021, required for environmental labels under the EPR regulations, asks for evidence that collection and recycling facilities are available and that the product is actually being collected and recycled.• SAPRO and the SA Plastics Pact count a material as recyclable only when at least 30% of what is placed on the market is actually recycled.• The Plastics Pact names multilayer flexibles among the hardest categories to recycle locally, and its 2030 targets include a new goal for flexible packaging designed for recyclability.We support this approach. Labelling non-recyclable packaging as recyclable costs collectors money, erodes public trust and creates greenwashing risk under the Consumer Protection Act.
A used vacuum bag from a butchery or kitchen is food-contaminated and often printed, and today it has no dedicated collection route to a recycler. Recycling our own clean offcuts proves the material is recyclable; it does not yet prove post-consumer bags are recycled at scale. Buyers are right to ask for both.
What we already do: vacuum-bag film back into new products
Sun Plastics runs its own recycling plant alongside our extrusion lines. Edge trim, start-up scrap and rejected vacuum-bag film are reground, pelletised and used to make refuse bags and carrier bags. This proves the material can be recycled on commercial equipment, shows there is a real end market, and keeps our production waste out of landfill.
This is post-industrial (pre-consumer) recycling. It is a strong foundation, and the next step is to help used bags find their way into South Africa’s wider film recycling system.
Our roadmap: from technically recyclable to recycled in practice
1. Independent recyclability testing. Third-party testing against the RecyClass PE film protocol, plus assessment with the SAPRO / Designed for Earth tool. Results will be published.2. Compatibiliser optimisation. Where needed, we will tune our tie layers to meet RecyClass and CEFLEX conditions without compromising barrier or puncture performance.3. Partnering with post-consumer film recyclers. Used bags must be washed before reprocessing, and our plant is built for clean production waste. We will work with South African film recyclers that run wash lines, and with Polyco, to get PE/PA vacuum bags accepted in their LDPE streams, backed by our test data.4. Accurate labelling. Until post-consumer recycling reaches the 30% threshold, we will describe our bags as designed for PE recycling, with production waste recycled in-house, not with an unqualified “recyclable” claim.Get In Touch
Recycling flexible packaging at scale needs converters, brand owners, retailers, collectors and recyclers pulling together. If you pack products in vacuum bags, or you recycle post-consumer film and would like to trial our material, contact the Sun Plastics team. Together we can move vacuum bags from technically recyclable to recycled in practice.
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