Circular or chaos? Beverage packaging at crossroads
India's beverage packaging sector is caught between strong regulatory intent and weak on-ground implementation, with panellists at Drink Technology Delhi warning that meaningful circularity is still three to four years away
23 Apr 2026 | 54 Views | By Rahul Kumar
The panel discussion Circular or Chaos? Reinventing India's Beverage Packaging Playbook, held on 23 April at drink technology Delhi 2026 at Bharat Mandapam, brought together founders and senior industry executives to examine the state of sustainable packaging. Moderated by Garima Shahi, ESG consultant, the session surfaced a consensus that policy frameworks are advancing faster than the systems needed to execute them.
A hybrid, not a circular, economy
Jaywantjit Singh, founder and director of Oasis Beverages, described India's current position as neither linear nor circular, but hybrid. EPR rules are robust on paper, he argued, but inconsistently enforced on the ground, with much of the country's recycling infrastructure still driven by informal rag-pickers rather than formalised collection systems. He drew a pointed contrast with the GST rollout — binary in enforcement from day one — and estimated that meaningful circularity was at least three to four years away.
No universal material
Ayan Chattopadhyay, senior manager – filling and packing at Nestle, addressed the recurring debate around which packaging material is most sustainable. His answer was unambiguous: there is none. Glass carries a high carbon footprint in both production and transportation despite its recyclability. Paper, while compostable, requires sourcing from responsibly managed forests and presents durability challenges. Plastics such as PP are lightweight with lower transport emissions, but their global recycling rate remains low and the necessary collection infrastructure is absent across much of India.
He pointed to digital tools — industrial internet of things (IIoT) sensors, digital twins, AI-based cameras for anomaly detection, and blockchain for traceability — as practical ways manufacturers can reduce waste and manage costs while working within whatever material constraints apply.
Stainless steel and the green premium
Mayukh Hazarika, founder and chief executive of Raincheck Earth, offered the panel's most unconventional case study. His brand packages gin in stainless steel flasks fitted with an integrated jigger — a 30-ml measure built into the cap. “The moment you say, 'buy us because we are sustainable,' it is the weakest argument,” he said. His view was that sustainability should be evident rather than advertised, and that greenwashing — positioning a product primarily on environmental credentials — undermines perceived product quality.
On cost, he was direct: The green premium must be passed to the customer. His brand carries a 30% export market, which provides additional commercial headroom that purely domestic brands may not have.
Price still trumps sustainability at scale
The panel's sharpest challenge to sustainability advocates came from Nitesh Singh, chief executive and founder of Blue Tea. For the large majority of Indian consumers, he argues, price determines purchase decisions, not packaging. He cited India's per capita income of below USD 3,000 against more than USD 90,000 in the United States as the structural reason sustainability cannot be a mass-market driver in the near term.
He referenced fast fashion brand Snitch reaching INR 1,000-crore in revenue without any sustainability positioning as evidence of how large a segment of the market remains indifferent to environmental claims.
Jaywantjit Singh reinforced the point: Coca-Cola sells certain products in India at INR 10, the same price as glass bottles 30 years ago, while the equivalent retails at INR 60–80 in the United Arab Emirates. Both agreed that mass-market sustainability in India will require policy enforcement rather than consumer preference as the primary lever.
Shahi closed the session by drawing together the main threads: technology as an enabler, clear business strategy, and precise knowledge of the target consumer as the three conditions that make circularity commercially viable rather than merely aspirational.
The panel was held on 23 April 2026 at drink technology Delhi, co-located with IFAT Delhi at Hall 6, Bharat Mandapam, New Delhi.