biodegradable packaging material

The demand of food packaging has increased along with food consumption. Among all types of packaging materials petroleum-based packaging are most commonly used owing to their good mechanical, barrier and permeability characteristics. However, most petroleum based plastics are non-biodegradable and their raw materials come from non renewable resources. This has urged researchers to explore biodegradable food packaging films from renewable resources. Natural polymers such as carbohydrates based (starch, cellulose, hemicellulose or pectin) polymers can be effectively used for the synthesis of biodegradable food packaging films.