Overpacking is a common problem

A lady bought an 8-piece set of glasses on the Internet. She was shocked when she received the parcel. The cup was small, but the parcel was a big box that was more than half a meter long. After opening, it was a layer of foam board, and then each one. The cups are individually packaged with a layer of shockproof plastic air bubbles and densely packed tape. There are also a large number of foam pellets in the cup. The total packaging adds up to several kilos. In the face of these packaging materials, she really made a hard time - it took up place, sold worthless, and thrown away.

Overpacking even expresses the “wrapped dumplings”, which seems to be a common problem in the express delivery industry. According to statistics from the State Post Bureau, in 2015, the country's express delivery consumed 2.96 billion woven bags, 8.26 billion plastic bags, 9.9 billion packaging boxes, and 16.95 billion meters of tape, and the final destination of these materials was landfills. Waste is just one of the problems caused by excessive packaging, and there is pollution. "Economic Daily" recently disclosed that at present, some e-commerce and courier companies make heavy use of inferior, non-environmentally friendly packaging materials that are not only difficult to degrade, pollute the environment, but are also likely to endanger human health. In fact, in August this year, the State Post Bureau issued the "Implementation Plan for Promoting the Green Packaging Industry in the Express Industry" and proposed that express delivery industry packaging should achieve significant results in terms of greening, reduction, and recycling.

The proliferation of inferior materials and all kinds of chaos in the industry exposes not only some companies to disregard public interests for reducing costs, but also has weaknesses in supervision. According to media investigations, at present, the laws and regulations for express packaging in China are only standard and are not mandatory, and express plastic bags are not within the scope of “plastic limit”. This also reminds the relevant departments to seize the “bulls” that govern over-packaging. On the one hand, it is necessary to improve industry standards and refine standards, such as the environmental protection standards for materials, the size specifications of packaging, and the specific requirements for recycling, so that the courier companies can have chapters to follow. On the other hand, it is necessary to intensify supervision and issue specific and feasible punitive measures for overpacking as soon as possible to ensure that standards are implemented without compromise.

“If it is not necessary, do not add entities.” This is a famous assertion of the William of Occam of the 14th century English philosopher O'Connell. It is vividly called “Okang Razor” and is actually “the principle of simple and effective”. Excessive packaging also obviously requires a "razor" to guide companies to simplify the packaging, shave unnecessary or even harmful things, return to a simple and practical way. It is worth mentioning that relevant departments have already begun to select a certain number of express delivery companies to carry out trials in terms of standardization, reduction, and recycling of packaging, and to explore effective technical implementation paths and policy paths. Some courier companies also actively promote new environmentally friendly materials for recycling and recycling. Following this path, we will continue to work tirelessly. According to the country's 202.6 billion express delivery business in 2015, the resources saved will certainly be considerable.