Animals and human beings alike have needs for packaging. The need is to store things safely so that they can be transported or protected from marauders or decay. Although modern science and technology trains all its guns on better ways of packaging it was also a concern of stone aged people. Cave dwellers dug pits, lined them with grass and packed in nuts for the future. The ability to preserve commodities from rot and decay must be one of the most fundamental aspects of growth and survival.
Nature has evolved a practical way of storing seeds so that they are dispersed far from their mother tree. The edible flesh in which each seed is packaged may be carried by foragers who eat the flesh and so disperse the seeds, either by careless dropping or through their digestive systems that give new plants a good start in life.
Mud, leaves, grass and vegetable husks have been used by human beings since the earliest of times. The San people used dried gourds called calabashes to store water in desert sands. Ostrich egg shells were used for the same purposes after a hole had been made and the original contents removed. Potters have fashioned containers from clay for almost as long as human society has existed, as excavations show. Animal skins have also been used since the earliest of times for packaging water and wine.
Cardboard boxes appeared in the early nineteenth century and quickly became indispensable in the industrialized world. They may be folded quickly and easily into many different sizes and flattened again when more space is required. A quick glance at the boxes for recycling outside any supermarket will illustrate how useful they are in industry. The wooden box once so useful to pirates for storing treasure, has been relegated to auction rooms where it may be sold for a small fortune on account of rarity value.
Crumpled paper is excellent packaging material for fragile items like glasses. It prevents them from shaking and vibrating. Newsprint has already served one purpose and so using it as a filling inside a cardboard box makes a light and safe package.
Glass is a stable substance that is excellent for storing foods that might be tainted when exposed to more volatile surfaces. Though brittle glass will not decompose easily and is quite a dangerous substance when it is left about as litter. Many people remember nostalgically the days when milk was packed in glass bottles and seemed to taste quite different.
In the 1930s polyethylene was invented, and this was followed in the 1950s by polypropylene. These substances are cheap, flexible and durable and they quickly replaced natural materials which are so much more expensive. Plastics are excellent packaging materials but do not decompose when left about as litter on earth or at sea.
The tin can was invented in the twentieth century. Food and drink containers made of metal were once soldered with lead and were dangerous for that reason, but are no longer sealed off on this way. Food and rink can be stored in these containers for very long periods. An advantage that they have is that they do compose and return to the earth though slowly.
At about the same time that plastic packaging became popular environmentalist pointed to the problem of litter. The environment is despoiled by waste composed mainly of discarded packaging materials. Although this problem has been solved in developed countries by education in places like Africa the population is impervious to education. It remains for technologists to invent packaging that has other uses or biodegrades very quickly. Something like the flesh of fruit or the husk of a nut will possibly make an appearance soon to solve the problem.
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