Dublin, March 24, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The "Agricultural Packaging Market - Growth, Trends, COVID-19 Impact, and Forecasts (2021 - 2026)" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

The agricultural packaging market is expected to reach a CAGR of 5.5% during the forecast period (2021 - 2026). The demand for agricultural packaging increases due to the increasing demand for improving supply chains by reducing food wastage. According to the UK's Birmingham Energy Institute, more than 90% of the food wastage in developing countries occurs during storage and transportation. Hence the growing awareness regarding the loss of food products during harvesting and shipping drives the demand for cost-effective and sustainable agricultural packaging solutions.

The increasing pest attacks drive the demand for various crop protection chemicals such as pesticides and fertilizers and are toxic. Hence, they need advanced packaging to reduce the risk while handling, storing, and transporting these agrochemicals, which escalates the demand for agricultural packaging solutions for agrochemicals to increase their shelf life.

According to an article published in the journal of Environmental Science and Technology, food travels an average of 4,200 miles. This creates demand for innovative packaging solutions to cater to farmers' requirements, processors distributors who sell in the global and national markets. Moreover, agricultural packaging solutions are experiencing the horizontal integration approaches that bring printing capabilities, easy packaging solutions, and additional value-adding solutions to packaging closer to the packaging solution providers.

Furthermore, technological innovation, sustainability trepidations, and attractive economics drive the demand for innovative packaging solutions. Nowadays, there is a growing demand for agricultural packages equipped with monitoring equipment, which can be used to track the quality of any product and adjust the temperature.

Also, the advanced packaging styles, such as pouches and bag-in-box, raise the usage of flexible packaging in combination with rigid packaging formats. According to the Flexible Packaging Association, flexible packaging is mainly used for food, contributing to more than 60% of the total market. Additionally, globally, the e-commerce sector's consolidation is anticipated to make flexible packaging one of the quickly growing packaging approaches over the forecast period.

With the recent outbreak of COVID-19, the packaging industry faces some unique challenges due to the lockdown, which has brought the entire packaging supply chain to an almost grinding halt. However, government and regulatory bodies are strengthening the requirements of food processing and packaging to provide safe food to consumers globally, which are likely to influence the packaging industry to bring solutions and grow during the forecast period.

Key Market Trends

Plastic Packaging to Hold the Significant Market Share

• Plastic packaging is influencing market growth due to the rising demand for flexible packaging as consumers prefer these solutions. For instance, according to the Flexible Packaging Association, more than 60% of North American consumers are ready to pay for functional packaging benefits, such as product protection, supply chain efficacy, and shipping friendly, among others.
• Polyethylene is the cheapest packaging film. The polyethylene materials that are being used for barrier film include HDPE, LDPE, and LLDPE. Polyethylene is easy to process and is combined with gas/aroma barriers, such as PA and EVOH, for their use in various applications. The essential grade of material among these is the linear low-density polyethylene (LLDPE). It is a high-clarity film that is widely used for food packaging.
• Moreover, Plastics are used in either rigid or flexible form as the packaging material for fertilizers and pesticides. The factors such as lightweight, durable, and economical to manufacture are the reasons behind the growing adoption of plastic in the market.
• Plastics also drives innovation in packaging design. For instance, modified atmosphere packaging helps preserve food freshness by capturing a reduced-oxygen air mixture in a plastic package. This technique can benefit farmers, processors, and distributors that sell in global and national markets and extend the product's shelf life by slowing the growth of bacteria.
• Furthermore, players in the market are investing in implementing new technologies for preventing post-harvest loss. For instance, Dupont offers h20ex, a plastic film cover for food containers with a high water vapor transmission rate that reduces mold and product weight loss.

Asia-Pacific to Witness Highest Growth

• Asia-Pacific is experiencing many investments and technological advancements, such as AI-based technologies in agriculture. The emerging countries of the APAC region are rapidly adopting smart technologies across the agriculture space.The adoption of precision farming in the region is fueled by various factors, like continuous advancements in technology, a reduced price of equipment, social media use, and online publications that help create awareness.
• Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba recently got into the farming sector by deploying artificial intelligence in agriculture to assist farmers in increasing crop yield, simultaneously reducing costs. In their smartphones, Alibaba's digitally-recorded information was accessed by farmers, enabling them to monitor whether fruits are ready to be harvested or any pest attack on their standing crops.
• The region is also witnessing higher adoption of sustainable packaging solutions for agricultural products, creating opportunities for global brands to invest in the region further.The rise in the farm yield along with accelerated growth witnessed in a plethora of end-use industries such as seed and pesticides & fertilizers is expected to boost Asia Pacific agricultural packaging market size during the forecast period.

Competitive Landscape

The agricultural packaging market is moderately fragmented. Players in the market are innovating their design, technology, and applications to achieve sustainable competitive advantage. Moreover, they are adopting competitive strategies such as partnerships, mergers, and acquisitions. Some of the key development in the market are :

• In June 2020 - Amcor plc partnered with Espoma Organic, a lawn and garden brand, to innovate sustainable packaging and launch a new bio-based polymer package. The polyethylene (PE) film contains 25 percent bio-based material derived from sugar cane in this case.
• In June 2020 - Mondi, a global packaging and paper group, has completed the implementation of a new state of the art paper sack converting machine at its Nyiregyhaza site in Hungary. The machine can allow the plant to open a new line of paper sacks for food packaging and can help to produce more than 130 million sacks annually.

Reasons to Purchase this report:

• The market estimate (ME) sheet in Excel format
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Key Topics Covered:

1 INTRODUCTION
1.1 Study Assumptions and Market Definition

2 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

3 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

4 MARKET INSIGHT
4.1 Market Overview
4.2 Market Drivers
4.2.1 Growing demand from the agrochemical segment
4.2.2 Material-based innovations to enhance shelf life of products and ongoing theme of sustainability in packaging
4.3 Market Challenges
4.3.1 Regulatory & price-related challenges
4.3.2 Diminishing profit margins remains a concern for smaller manufacturers
4.4 Market Opportunities (Material innovations in bulk packaging focused on the use of PP and bulk bags)
4.5 Industry Stakeholder Analysis - Material suppliers, Packaging manufacturers, distributors, end-users, etc.
4.6 Industry Attractiveness - Porter's Five Forces Analysis
4.6.1 Bargaining Power of Suppliers
4.6.2 Bargaining Power of Consumers
4.6.3 Threat of New Entrants
4.6.4 Threat of Substitute Products
4.6.5 Intensity of Competitive Rivalry
4.7 Assessment of COVID-19 on the Agricultural Packaging (Marginal decline witnessed as packaging has been identified as one of the essential supply chain activities in major countries - Demand for bulk packaging to remain intact - Mono-technology based packaging to witness higher demand)
4.8 Current demand for produce & Retail-based Packaging

5 MARKET SEGMENTATION
5.1 By Material Type
5.1.1 Plastic
5.1.1.1 Rigid
5.1.1.2 Flexible
5.1.2 Metal
5.1.3 Paper and Paperboards
5.1.4 Composite Materials
5.1.5 Other Materials
5.2 By Type
5.2.1 Pesticides
5.2.2 Fertilizers
5.2.3 Seed
5.2.4 Other Types
5.3 By Product Type
5.3.1 Bags & Sacks (Plastic & Paper)
5.3.2 Bulk Containers (Drums & IBC)
5.3.3 Pouches
5.3.4 Containers (Metal & Plastic)
5.3.5 Other Products (Boxes, Caps & Lids, etc.)
5.4 Geography
5.4.1 North America
5.4.1.1 US
5.4.1.2 Canada
5.4.2 Europe
5.4.2.1 France
5.4.2.2 Germany
5.4.2.3 UK
5.4.2.4 The Netherlands
5.4.2.5 Rest of Europe
5.4.3 Asia Pacific
5.4.3.1 China
5.4.3.2 India
5.4.3.3 Indonesia
5.4.3.4 Rest of APAC
5.4.4 Rest of the World
5.4.4.1 Africa
5.4.4.2 Brazil
5.4.4.3 Turkey

6 COMPETITIVE INTELLIGENCE
6.1 Company Profiles*
6.1.1 LC Packaging International
6.1.2 Grief Inc
6.1.3 Mondi Group
6.1.4 NNZ Group
6.1.5 Packaging Corporation of America
6.1.6 Sonoco Products Company
6.1.7 Epac Holdings LLC
6.1.8 Silgan Holdings
6.1.9 Bemis Company Inc
6.1.10 BAG Corporation
6.1.11 DuPont de Nemours Inc.
6.1.12 Amcor plc

7 MARKET OUTLOOK

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