ANA was the first Japanese airline to change the main food containers in August 2021 for international economy class in-flight meals from plastic to bagasse, which is friendly to the global environment. The change to bagasse material, which is produced by recycling sugar cane stems and leaves, leads to a reduction in the amount of plastic used.
The new bagasse food containers meet the strict safety and hygiene requirements of in-flight meals, which require maintaining a stable quality in various environments both on the ground and in the sky, so customers can enjoy their meals as before.
ANA Group aims to reduce the disposal rate of resources such as plastics and paper to zero by 2050. By changing the material of main food containers for in-flight meals, which accounts for the largest amount of plastic used in in-flight items to bagasse material, we will reduce the use of plastics by about 317 tons per year (compared to FY2019), which is about 30% of the total amount of disposable plastic used previously.
In 2022, we changed the material of in-flight meal containers for premium class on domestic flights from disposable plastic to paper, soup bowls and other containers that had been disposable were switched to reusable items, reducing the amount of disposable plastic waste. This will reduce plastic waste by approximately 158 tons per year (FY2019 actual), or about 10% of the amount of disposable plastic used on board.
As a result of these efforts, the ANA Group is on track to achieve its mid- to long-term environmental goal of "reducing the plastic and other resources disposal rate to zero by 2050" by FY2022. In FY2023, we will accelerate our efforts to reduce the disposal of resources by verifying the materials and quality of used plastic films for air cargo and establish a scheme to reuse them as plastic products to be used by ANA again.
ANA will continue to change the materials of various items to environmentally friendly materials to further reduce disposable plastics used.
Japan
As an airline group centered on the aviation business, the ANA Group is developing various businesses while making use of its domestic and overseas aviation networks and customer base.
