PETpla.net Insider 06 / 2013

EDITOUR REPORTS 13 PET planet insider Vol. 14 No. 06/13 decline. Five years ago the volume of the juice market was 750 million litres and we sold 500 million litres. Today the overall market is just 500 million litres, the same as we were bottling five years ago on our own“, he explains. Even so, the future had looked rosy. Sandora, once in private Ukrainian hands, has its own plant which processes all kinds of fruit and vegetables into juice and juice con- centrate. The main proportion, at 30,000t/a, is made up of apples and tomatoes; bringing up the rear and a long way down the line are carrots (10,000t/a carrots) and other fruits (5,000t/a). Within 24 hours of harvesting everything is packed into aseptic tanks and drums. Together with other fruit preparations from other countries, the aseptically bottled juices come rolling off the production lines in the Mykolayiv plant. The company supplies both the economy as well as the premium segment with vari- ous brands. Originally all the juices were produced on Tetrapack installa- tions. Once their competi- tor, Biola, had invested in aseptic PET in 2004 and immediately registered a market share of more than 15% in the Ukraine, San- dora followed suit. In 2006 the Ukraine company built a new plant in Mykolayiv and put two aseptic Pro- comac (Gea) systems into the plant along with two Sipa blowers. Designed for 20,000bph, the inten- tion was likewise to ensure growth in juice production. But the world economic crisis put a spanner in the works. Juice became too expensive for the Ukraini- ans. Sandora was unable to halt the fall in volume, even with its economy brands. Juice in PET also lagged behind expectations. Here, because PET bottles do not incorporate any barriers, (usual in the Ukraine), some UV-sensitive juices were becoming discoloured within a period of four weeks. As a result, more consumers were opting for Tetrapak containers. This meant that the 25 Tetrapak installations were going at full steam packaging juices in cartons. Today, in the market for juices, their cartons have a share of 45% whilst juice in PET is treading water with a roughly 1% share. However, Biola was unable to maintain the original level of 15% and is now significantly below 10%. We are naturally interested in which type of packag- ing now represents better value for money – the carton or the aseptic PET bottle. “From the point of view of purely material and personnel costs and depreciation, the mono- layer PET bottle is ahead, but if you take into account the resources such as energy consumption, together with the chemicals required for disinfection purposes etc., then the PET bottle comes out slightly more expensive than the carton”, was Mr Egorenko’s verdict.