The Huber Group-Micro Inks has introduced in India its Gecko range of inks for flexible packaging applications. The twin events organized by Huber Group-Micro Inks in Mumbai on 20 March 2015 and in Delhi NCR on 21 March 2015 were graced by senior management of the Huber Group from Germany, Italy and India and in attendance were members of the print community, brand owners and existing customers.
The Gecko system for flexo and gravure processes is designed taking into consideration important global regulations and is manufactured under strict GMP guidelines with a key focus on ‘safety first’ for flexible packaging inks in the Indian food segment. Since a large
portion of food packaging is printed using solvent-based ink systems, a minor risk with regard to migration is present. For Gecko inks raw material selection follows stringent parameters keeping in mind issues such as toxicity, migration, and more. The Gecko brand is already an established one in Europe.
Ashwani Bhardwaj, managing director of Micro Inks said that whenever there is a discussion about safety aspects of printing inks or packaging applications in India, the argument revolves mainly around the issue of whether the ink is toluene free or it contains toluene.
“The ink system that we are introducing today goes beyond toluene,” Bhardwaj said adding that the Gecko ink system conforms to stringent expectations of today’s safe food packaging. Stressing that food safety issues have been a raging topic of discussion in the industry currently, Bhardwaj said, “We feel it is our duty to provide safer print solutions that the industry demands. We felt the time is now right for us to reach out to our partners whether they are converters or print buyers and share with them what we can do when it comes to food safety. It is the consumer safety which is at the heart of the entire discussion.”
designed taking into consideration important global
regulations and is manufactured under strict GMP
guidelines with a key focus on ‘safety first’ for flexible
packaging inks in the Indian food segment
Sounding optimistic about the support from the industry, he said that the way the Gecko system has been designed it will meet the requirements of all the segments of the industry. Ursula Borgmann, group CEO and chief technology officer, Huber Group said that the Group now is in a position to offer a well-proven quality ink range of low migration inks for flexo and gravure printing on manifold substrates to the Indian market well before it will become legally compulsory.
“I would like to invite all our customers to test our knowledge and let us help move towards safer food packaging,” she said adding that in variance to the R&D projects for products for the publication sector, Huber Group’s packaging-oriented R&D work has developed far beyond printability targets. “In addition to various requirements of print performance, adhesion, cohesion and fastness, the focus has been targeted mainly to the safety needs necessary to protect the foodstuff inside the packaging, and last, but not the least, against
migration of particles from ink layers onto the actual food. To cope with such challenges intensive development work for non-migrating raw material for ink formulation as well as analytical work has been carried out.”
