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The National Recycling Coalition Recognizes Green Bay Packaging and More

On Tuesday, October 20, 2020, The National Recycling Coalition (NRC) honored its recycling awards recipients at its Virtual 2020 Annual Members Meeting. The awards were digitally presented to the winners via Zoom. The annual awards program is designed to honor and recognize outstanding individuals, programs and organizations around the country, both for their achievements and to serve as a model and a resource for learning for NRC members.

“Green Bay Packaging is honored to be recognized as a leader and innovator for our recycling and diversion business practices and operations”, says Matt Szymanski, vice president of Mill Operations. “We are grateful to be the recipient of the 2020 National Recycling Coalition Outstanding Business Leadership award for our innovative cradle-to-cradle and closed-loop recycling achievements. We are proud of our team and the Green Bay community, for their support and commitment to sustainability.”

NRC’s Awards Committee Chair Lisa Skumatz commented on the process expressing the views of fellow committee members, “We were pleased to receive so many nominees from all across the county, meriting winners from Alaska to Florida, and from the latest high tech to long-standing rural models! The committee worked hard to sort from among the very strong submittals to find those shining examples.” She notes that “The winners embodied best practices, especially during this unique year due to the Covid-19 pandemic and the challenges that many organizations have been facing.”

Outstanding Business Leadership-For Profit Company: Green Bay Packaging

Green Bay Packaging’s containerboard mill in Green Bay is a fully integrated pulp and paper mill that produces linerboard and corrugated medium in the full spectrum of basis weights using 100% post-consumer recycled fiber. GBP partners with customers to optimize the collection of old corrugated containers (OCC) recovered in their recycling processes, diverting 2.25 million cubic yards of solid was away from landfills in 2019. That effort regenerates corrugated shipping containers with fewer resources while reducing the carbon footprint. In its efforts to close the loop on OCC and mixed paper, the company promotes sustainability through resource conservation, pollution prevention, recycling, responsible forestry, energy conservation, waste reduction and a closed loop in the water system.

The award categories recognize outstanding programs in for-profit businesses, higher education, non-profit organizations and community/governmental programs as well as awards for outstanding emerging leader and lifetime achievement.