Nippon Paper Industries Co., Ltd. announced on October 6, 2026 that it has launched an initiative to achieve “Pack to Pack” recycling — reusing used beverage cartons as raw material for new cartons. The company produces high-quality pulp from food-grade recovered paper, including beverage cartons collected through separate domestic collection, and reuses it as raw material for carton base paper. Nippon Paper states that this is Japan’s first prototype of closed-loop (bottle-to-bottle style) recycling for beverage cartons, and is exhibiting it at “TOKYO PACK 2026 – Tokyo International Packaging Exhibition,” held October 14–16 at Tokyo Big Sight.
Beverage cartons are made primarily from renewable, wood-based pulp, making them an environmentally friendly packaging material in their own right. At the same time, there is a need to improve collection rates for used cartons and to expand the range of applications for recycled carton material.
According to the “2026 Carton Recycling Annual Report,” the carton collection rate for fiscal year 2024 stood at 38.9%, falling short of the 50% target (including damaged cartons and recovered paper) set by the National Milk Carton Environmental Council, an industry body that promotes the collection and recycling of beverage cartons in Japan. Leveraging the high quality of pulp derived from recovered carton paper, the Nippon Paper Group has so far mainly reused it in sanitary paper products such as tissue and toilet roll.
This initiative made use of the company’s unique integrated production system. Used cartons and other materials were pulped using dedicated recycling equipment for food and beverage paper containers at the Fuji Mill, and the resulting pulp was used as raw material to produce carton base paper at a Nippon Paper mill. The base paper was then processed into cartons at Nippon Paper Liquid Package Products Co., Ltd., a specialist carton-manufacturing subsidiary, before being filled and formed using the “NS-FUJI” filling machine at the company’s Technical Center. NS-FUJI is an aseptic filling and packaging system jointly developed by Nippon Paper and Shikoku Kakoki Co., Ltd. that enables long-term preservation of beverages.
In aseptic filling cartons such as those used with NS-FUJI, the entire inner surface of the container is coated with resin, meaning the cut edges of the paper never come into direct contact with the liquid contents.
Going forward, Nippon Paper aims to expand the reuse of recovered carton paper and improve collection rates as part of its “PakUpcycle®” project. The company says it will further promote resource circulation for beverage cartons and enhance their value as a renewable resource, contributing to the realization of sustainable packaging.
【Press release】Japan’s First Prototype for Closed-Loop Recycling of Beverage Cartons
