SINGAPORE, August 31, 2026 : For Andreas Gunnestrand, President and Regional Manager of tesa tape Asia Pacific, the future of packaging in Asia-Pacific will not be shaped by material substitution alone. It will be shaped by whether companies can redesign packaging systems that are recyclable, commercially scalable and strong enough to perform in real supply chains.
In an email interview, Gunnestrand said sustainability is increasingly becoming a packaging system design challenge for consumer brands, manufacturers and regulators across Asia-Pacific. Companies are no longer assessing packaging only on cost and performance, but also on recyclability, material efficiency and carbon impact.
“The shift is that sustainability is no longer a ‘material swap’ discussion, it is increasingly a packaging system design challenge,” Gunnestrand said. “Across Asia-Pacific, customers are moving at different speeds, but the direction is clear.”
For businesses across the region, this creates a more complex decision-making environment. Packaging must still protect products, withstand logistics networks, support manufacturing throughput and remain commercially viable. At the same time, it is expected to reduce material complexity, improve recyclability and support sustainability targets.
Gunnestrand said this is where adhesive technologies deserve greater attention. “At tesa, we don’t just supply tapes, we enable better packaging design at scale,” he said, adding that the company sees its role as helping customers achieve functionality and sustainability without compromising throughput, reliability or end-of-life outcomes.
Why Adhesives Matter in Packaging Strategy
Adhesive tapes may represent only a small part of the packaging system, but Gunnestrand said they can have a significant effect on how packaging performs, how easily it can be recycled and how efficiently it moves through production and logistics.
In packaging, adhesive solutions support functions such as sealing, opening, closing and reinforcement. tesa sees these not simply as operational requirements, but as design levers that can help companies simplify packaging structures and improve circularity.
For paper-based packaging, selected tesa paper-based design tapes are designed to support mono-material concepts and have been tested for technical recyclability in established paper recycling processes. Gunnestrand said such solutions can reduce the need for material separation and help brands and packaging producers move closer to circular economy goals, while retaining performance and commercial viability.
“Adhesives are not just a bonding layer, they can be an enabling layer for circularity at scale,” he said.
This point is increasingly relevant for consumer goods, e-commerce, logistics and industrial companies in Asia-Pacific, where packaging is under pressure to become lighter, simpler and more recyclable without weakening supply chain reliability.
Turning Sustainability Targets Into Practical Solutions
tesa’s approach in Asia-Pacific is anchored in translating global sustainability goals into practical customer solutions. Gunnestrand said the company is focused on outcomes that are technically credible, commercially scalable and aligned with local packaging realities across a diverse region.
Globally, tesa has set targets across emissions, responsible sourcing, materials and circularity. One of its targets is for 70 percent of the materials used in its products and packaging to be recycled or bio-based by 2030. The company is also investing in solvent-free production technologies and solutions designed with end-of-life considerations in mind.
However, Gunnestrand said the measure of progress is not merely whether a more sustainable product exists, but whether it solves real customer challenges. That means working with partners, manufacturers and converters to understand substrates, production processes, performance requirements and sustainability goals, then engineering solutions that work on production lines and in the real world.
For Asia-Pacific businesses, the implication is that sustainable packaging decisions must be made across procurement, product design, manufacturing, logistics and sustainability teams, rather than being left only to compliance or marketing functions.
Performance Is Part of Sustainability
Gunnestrand rejected the idea that sustainability and performance should be treated as competing objectives. For tesa, a packaging solution cannot be considered truly sustainable if it fails to protect the product, breaks down during transport or creates operational inefficiency.
“If a ‘more sustainable’ packaging solution cannot protect the product, run reliably through production or withstand transportation demands, it will not achieve meaningful adoption,” he said. “For us, sustainability is only meaningful when it delivers uncompromised performance.”
This is particularly important for e-commerce, logistics and industrial customers. Packaging failure can lead to product damage, higher waste, customer dissatisfaction and additional costs. From tesa’s perspective, durability and product protection are therefore part of sustainable packaging, not separate from it.
The company’s approach is to engineer raw materials, adhesive formulation, production processes, application performance and end-of-life considerations as one system.
Building the Packaging Ecosystem
tesa’s sponsorship of the tesa Special Award at the Thai Packaging Design Awards 2026 also reflects its push to influence packaging innovation at the design stage.
Gunnestrand said platforms such as ThaiPDA bring together designers, students, brands and industry partners to explore how packaging can be designed more responsibly from the start. The tesa Special Award recognised packaging concepts that integrated tesa paper-based design tapes to enhance functionality, structural performance and visual appeal while embracing sustainable design principles.
For tesa, the engagement is not only about showcasing adhesive products. It is also about encouraging practical design thinking around circularity, functionality and material efficiency, and supporting ideas that are creative, technically feasible and aligned with sustainability goals.
This ecosystem approach is important because packaging value chains are fragmented. Material suppliers, adhesive manufacturers, packaging designers, converters, recyclers, brands and policymakers all influence whether circular packaging works in practice.
Gunnestrand said no single material supplier can create circular packaging alone. For adhesive companies such as tesa, the task is to work across the value chain and help stakeholders understand how individual design decisions affect the performance of the entire system.
Designing Ahead of Regulation
Asia-Pacific’s packaging markets are evolving at different speeds. Regulations vary widely, but Gunnestrand said customer expectations are already rising around recyclability, material efficiency, circularity and transparency over environmental impact.
His advice to companies is to design for where the market is heading, not only for today’s regulatory requirements.
“Leading companies should not design only for the regulation they face today,” he said. “Packaging development cycles, manufacturing investments and supply chains operate over many years. A more strategic approach is to anticipate where requirements and customer expectations are heading and build adaptability into packaging design now.”
For businesses, this means sustainable packaging is becoming a long-term competitiveness issue. Companies that redesign early may be better positioned to meet future regulations, customer expectations and brand commitments, while reducing the risk of expensive redesigns later.
The Next Phase of Sustainable Packaging
Over the next three to five years, Gunnestrand expects the industry conversation to move beyond using “more sustainable materials” towards redesigning packaging systems for circularity, backed by stronger evidence requirements for sustainability claims.
He expects growth in paper-based packaging, mono-material design, recycled and bio-based inputs, carbon transparency, and solutions compatible with existing recycling infrastructure and high-speed production environments.
For tesa, this is where adhesives become more strategic. Because adhesives sit at the interface between materials, the right technology can enable packaging structures that are simpler, recyclable, reliable and scalable.
By 2030, Gunnestrand said success for tesa tape Asia Pacific will be measured both by the progress it makes in its own portfolio and by the impact it enables for customers. By the end of 2025, recycled and bio-based materials accounted for 32 percent of the materials used in tesa products, while the company had reduced fossil virgin plastics in its packaging by 63 percent, surpassing its original target of 50 percent by the end of 2025.
In Asia-Pacific, success will mean helping customers redesign packaging systems, reduce material complexity, improve recyclability and make circularity commercially viable at scale.
For ABT readers, the business takeaway is clear. Sustainable packaging is no longer only a sustainability or compliance issue. It is becoming a product design, supply chain, manufacturing and brand competitiveness issue.
And in that shift, adhesives are moving from the background of packaging to a more strategic role in enabling circularity at scale.