Up to half of Christmas chocolate box weight is packaging

Sky News
Wrappers and packaging can make up almost half the weight of Christmas chocolates, a study has found.
Which? looked at some of the most popular sweet treats in the run up to Christmas and found the Ferrero Rocher tray was the worst offender in terms of packaging.
Of the total weight of the tray, 42% was packaging, and just 11% of that is recyclable.
Coming in second was the Thorntons Continental Selection, of which the packaging was 29.4% of the weight. Third was Cadbury Milk Tray which was 22.6%.
But Thorntons and Cadbury’s offerings have more easily recyclable packaging.
In the continental selection, 87% can be recycled, and in the Milk Tray, 93% can be.
At the other end, Which? found that Lindt Lindor was the most environmentally friendly in terms of packaging with only the chocolate wrappers themselves not recyclable.
Marks and Spencers’ The Big One had the least packaging by weight at 8.5%. Of their packaging, 71% can be recycled.
The survey by Which? found nearly half of people misidentified the green dot on packaging as meaning it was recyclable. In fact, the dot means the manufacturer pays into a recycling scheme.
Instead consumers should look out for a green chasing arrows triangle symbol.
Ferrero said: “Ferrero Collection is a delicately created product and the packaging is of fundamental importance to protect our chocolates from damage during transport, in the shops and at home.
“The box used for Ferrero Collection can be recycled only when the local infrastructure allows to do so but in the UK this is still not available. We are aware that some consumers like to reuse the boxes in fun and creative ways like those suggested on our website.”
Thorntons said: “Thorntons Continental packaging has been updated with a new hermetic tray seal, which ensures product freshness and avoids cross flavour tainting from the most intense tastes as Espresso or Sicilian Mousse.
“We are always reviewing our product range to ensure that we offer our consumers high quality taste experience.”
A Cadbury spokesman said: “Without robust packaging, the shelf life of many products would be far shorter and could create more food waste which is 10 times more detrimental to the environment than plastic.