The completion of a two-year project begun in December 2011 investigating the possible use of discarded tomato waste as a BPA substitute for can liners has been delayed until the end of March 2014 “in order to complete the test and confirm the first positive results,” according to Dr. Angela Montanari, coordinator of the BIOCOPAC Project. The project is funded by the Seventh Framework Programme of the European Communities, development and demonstration, 2007-2013.
The BIOCOPAC consortium is a private-public partnership including four leading research centers, four SMEs and three large enterprises from six EU countries. The partnership encompasses the whole agri-food chain—from the tomato processing and waste treatment industries to the lacquers and metal cans manufacturers.