EAD BY JUNKER, A NEW TOOL FOR THE TOBACCO SECTOR

Producers and importers of the tobacco sector, associated to Unindustria, have joined forces, and adopted for their packaging the Digital Environmental Label by Junker app to comply with the new law about environmental labeling, entering into force on January 1^st, 2023. Environmental information on packaging materials and how to dispose of them can be viewed just by scanning the product’s barcode. In this way, it is easy and immediate for the consumer to access disposal information, for example, for the packaging of traditional and electronic cigarettes.

Junker is the most widespread app for waste sorting in Italy, counting more than 2.5 million downloads. With Junker the user can scan the product’s barcode and get right away the disposal information, which is geolocated: it means that it varies according to the place the user lives in and thus the rules for waste sorting of that area. Geolocating the information would be impossible for a traditional label, plus Junker is already available in 12 languages, which makes it perfect for the European market.

EAD brings several advantages: no need to graphically disrupt the physical label of the packaging, immediate compliance with the new law, opportunity to value the effort of the companies towards environmental sustainability. The new digital tool for the tobacco sector will be released with a large informative campaign, involving 53.000 sales points in the entire country. EAD has been awarded as Best practice for environmental labeling by CONAI, the National Packaging Consortium, and it is also accessible to blind and visually impaired people.

Federico Sannella, President of the Food Department of Unindustria: “Our association has focused on a collaborative effort between our associates, by choosing a sustainable, digital solution that offers the best quality and reliability standards. Such tool will allow companies to comply with the new law requirements and to correctly inform consumers on waste sorting and disposal”.

“Our Digital Environmental Label - states Noemi De Santis, PR manager of Junker app – is available for all kinds of packaging, but the tobacco sector will unlock the full potential of our solution. The digital extension starting from the barcode itself, without putting additional information on the products’ label, is perfect for those packaging that are small and already full of information”.